Overview
April is a PhD student investigating the effects of non-antibiotic drugs on bacterial communities, with a focus on the evolution of antimicrobial resistance. She is based at the ECEHH laboratories at the University of Exeter Penryn campus. She is supervised by Dr Aimee Murray, Professor Will Gaze, and Dr Lihong Zhang from the ECEHH, alongside supervisors Professor Barbara Kasprzyk-Hordern and Professor Ed Feil from the University of Bath. April’s project is co-funded by Astra-Zeneca, and is supervised by Professor Jason Snape.
Before joining the Centre in September 2019, she graduated for an MSc in Microbiology at the University of Liverpool. For her Master’s dissertation project she investigated the ability of neutrophils to kill Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains from a range of backgrounds. This aimed to help inform future directions for research focused on Cystic Fibrosis.
Before this, April graduated with a BSc in Biomedicine from Lancaster University in 2017, where for her third year project, she identified and characterised unknown bacterial species and their antibiotic resistance profiles.
Qualifications
BSc Biomedicine (Hons), 2:1, Lancaster University
MSc Advanced Biological Sciences, Microbiology, Distinction, University of Liverpool
Links
Research
Research interests
Antimicrobial resistance
Ecology and evolution of bacterial communities
Pharmaceutical pollution
Publications
Key publications | Publications by category | Publications by year
Publications by category
Journal articles
Hayes A, May Murray L, Catherine Stanton I, Zhang L, Snape J, Hugo Gaze W, Kaye Murray A (2022). Predicting selection for antimicrobial resistance in UK wastewater and aquatic environments: Ciprofloxacin poses a significant risk.
Environ Int,
169Abstract:
Predicting selection for antimicrobial resistance in UK wastewater and aquatic environments: Ciprofloxacin poses a significant risk.
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a threat to human and animal health, with the environment increasingly recognised as playing an important role in AMR evolution, dissemination, and transmission. Antibiotics can select for AMR at very low concentrations, similar to those in the environment, yet their release into the environment, e.g. from wastewater treatment plants, is not currently regulated. Understanding the selection risk antibiotics pose in wastewater and receiving waters is key to understanding if environmental regulation of antibiotics is required. We investigated the risk of selection occurring in UK wastewater and receiving waters by determining where measured environmental concentration data (n = 8187) for four antibiotics (ciprofloxacin, azithromycin, clarithromycin, and erythromycin) collected in England and Wales 2015-2018 (sites n = 67) exceeded selective concentration thresholds derived from complex microbial community evolution experiments undertaken previously. We show that selection for AMR by ciprofloxacin is likely to have occurred routinely in England and Wales wastewater during the 2015-2018 period, with some seasonal and regional trends. Wastewater treatment reduces the selection risk posed by ciprofloxacin significantly, but not completely, and predicted risk in surface waters remains high in several cases. Conversely, the potential risks posed by the macrolides (azithromycin, clarithromycin, and erythromycin) were lower than those posed by ciprofloxacin. Our data demonstrate further action is needed to prevent selection for AMR in wastewater, with environmental quality standards for some antibiotics required in the future, and that selection risk is not solely a concern in low/middle income countries.
Abstract.
Author URL.
Publications by year
2022
Hayes A, May Murray L, Catherine Stanton I, Zhang L, Snape J, Hugo Gaze W, Kaye Murray A (2022). Predicting selection for antimicrobial resistance in UK wastewater and aquatic environments: Ciprofloxacin poses a significant risk.
Environ Int,
169Abstract:
Predicting selection for antimicrobial resistance in UK wastewater and aquatic environments: Ciprofloxacin poses a significant risk.
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a threat to human and animal health, with the environment increasingly recognised as playing an important role in AMR evolution, dissemination, and transmission. Antibiotics can select for AMR at very low concentrations, similar to those in the environment, yet their release into the environment, e.g. from wastewater treatment plants, is not currently regulated. Understanding the selection risk antibiotics pose in wastewater and receiving waters is key to understanding if environmental regulation of antibiotics is required. We investigated the risk of selection occurring in UK wastewater and receiving waters by determining where measured environmental concentration data (n = 8187) for four antibiotics (ciprofloxacin, azithromycin, clarithromycin, and erythromycin) collected in England and Wales 2015-2018 (sites n = 67) exceeded selective concentration thresholds derived from complex microbial community evolution experiments undertaken previously. We show that selection for AMR by ciprofloxacin is likely to have occurred routinely in England and Wales wastewater during the 2015-2018 period, with some seasonal and regional trends. Wastewater treatment reduces the selection risk posed by ciprofloxacin significantly, but not completely, and predicted risk in surface waters remains high in several cases. Conversely, the potential risks posed by the macrolides (azithromycin, clarithromycin, and erythromycin) were lower than those posed by ciprofloxacin. Our data demonstrate further action is needed to prevent selection for AMR in wastewater, with environmental quality standards for some antibiotics required in the future, and that selection risk is not solely a concern in low/middle income countries.
Abstract.
Author URL.
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