BIOPROSPECTING ELY COPPER MINE FOR DRUGS

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Overview

 

The emergence and rapid spread of multidrug resistant bacterial infections is a multifaceted problem that has created an impetus to find new antibiotics. Every year, at least two million people are infected with multidrug-resistant bacteria and roughly 23,000 patients die from these infections. The typical arsenal of chemical agents used for treatment are no longer effective; new antibiotics are needed. Extreme environments are understudied and represent an untapped source of bioactive compounds. These environments are characterized as having high salinity, extreme temperatures, minimal light, concentrated metals and variable acidity and pressure. Metal-contaminated environments, such as acid rock drainage, select for microbes with resistance mechanisms, including metal and antibiotic resistance genes, which both share structural and functional characteristics. Some of these metal resistance genes (MRGs) are also antibiotic resistance genes that may be indicators of the function/bioactivity of secondary metabolites if they are co-expressed and co-localized with these genes. Thus, MRGs may be used to bioprospect new antibiotics.

 

One of our main objectives is to understand the connection between the expression of MRGs and the production of antibiotics. Ely Brook, which drains Ely Copper Mine, an Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site in Vershire, VT. The physicochemical properties of this site have been monitored over for 20+ years and has been found to have decreasing levels of metal concentrations along the brook. Using a combination of microbiology, LC/MS, metagenomics, metatranscriptomics, and bioinformatics, we are exploring the potential of the Ely Brook microbiome to produce new antibiotics. Click here for more information.

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