In spite of antibioticresistancebeing a major threat to public health, the persistence and fate of antibiotic-resistantbacteria (ARBs) and antibioticresistancegenes (ARGs) in the environmenthavenotbeencomprehensivelyexplored. Usually, ARGsoccur in twoforms: intracellularARGs (iARGs) and extracellularARGs (eARGs). Researchisaccumulatingconcerning the role of iARGs in proliferatingantibioticresistance, butthere are fewstudiesaddressing the role of eARGs. Research, however, suggeststhateARGs play a more crucialrole in the spread of ARGsthanpreviouslythought. The focus of our work is to utilize the best availabletechnologies to evaluateARGs (iARGs and eARGs) and the microbialcommunities in aquaticenvironments in terms of environmentalantibioticresistome. Thiswill facilitate the understanding of the distribution pattern of gene transfer elements and assesstheirabundance. Amongour prime interests, weintend to test the presence of eARGsboth in natural and engineeredaquaticenvironments. The use of sequence-basedmetagenomicapproacheswill be helpful in understanding the diversity of communities and changes in an environmentas a result of human-linkedactivities. In addition, generating sample-specific and temporalantibiotic-resistantprofileswill be helpful to betterunderstandmicrobialecology and the transmission of antibiotic-resistantgenes from oneecosystem to another. Also, we are interested in understandinghowenvironmentalfactorssuchas temperature, organicmatter, pH, heavymetals, and nutrientsaffect the persistence and spread of eARGs.
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