17th JPIAMR transnational call for research projects - AMR Interventions 2024 (IMPACT)

General Information

• Project title: Identification of potential combination treatment options for urinary tract infections caused by multidrug resistant Escherichia. coli
• Type: Project looking for partner
• Organisation: UK Health Security Agency
• Country: United Kingdom (UK)
• Career stage: Other.

Research area

• Scientific area(s) of the call:
  1. Topic 2: Improve and/or, compare and/or evaluate strategies, technologies, treatments, methods, protocols or data collection based on existing interventions, aiming to prevent or reduce the emergence or spread of antibacterial or antifungal resistance or to treat/cure infections caused by resistant bacteria/fungi and recommend new policies.
• Subtopics:
  1. Improve and/or compare and/ or evaluate the effectiveness of existing interventions (e.g. cost effectiveness clinical utility, socio-economic adaptability, reducing AMR emergence, spread, transmission, treatment etc.)

• One Health Setting:

  Human Health

• Keywords:

  Carbapenem resistant enterobacterales; multi drug-resistant E.coli; urinary tract infection; optimised treatment combinations therapy.

• Brief description of your expertise / expertise you are looking for:

  I head the Discovery Group at UK Health Security Agency, Porton Down and I am the co-founder and chair of the Porton AMR network. The group has expertise in the evaluation of current and novel antibiotics against Mycobacterium tuberculosis, NTM, and other emerging AMR pathogens, in host-relevant microbial models (including fermenters and biofilms), with particular expertise in the development of assays for the evaluation of antibiotic combinations. We have the technology and know-how to perform high throughput screens (including under high containment) and are in possession of a number of compound libraries. All our translational research is underpinned by fundamental research to understand bacterial physiology and molecular mechanisms.

• Brief description of your project / the project you would like to join:

  Urinary tract infections (UTI) are some of the most common infections worldwide. Their treatment with antibiotics is becoming more challenging, due to the rise in antibiotic resistant organisms. Treatment of UTIs is complicated by bacterial infections caused by E. coli that are resistant to multiple antibiotics. The ‘last-line’ treatment option for these infections is an antibiotic class called carbapenems. However, resistance to these antibiotics is also becoming more frequent. New antibiotics are required to combat these antibiotic resistant organisms. However, the last twenty years of antimicrobial research has failed to deliver this much awaited milestone. In the face of no new antibiotic being available to treat these resistant infections, new and/optimised treatments for UTIs are needed. Our approach is to used unbiased screening to identify combinations of existing antibiotics that are able to work effectively together and achieve activity that is greater than the sum it’s their parts. Novel compounds may also be included in combination with existing antibiotics (e.g., potentiators), and MedChem is an aspect to our project. Screening of our compound libraries may also identify other existing scaffolds that can be repurposed/modified. To evaluate large numbers of combinations quickly and effectively, methods that have been developed by the Discovery Team for TB and COVID-19 for will be used in the project. The Discovery team is seeking collaborations with AMR reference labs beyond the UK to enable a comparative assessment of the emergence of carbapenem-resistance, characterisation of emerging strains and their resistance profiles, and the types of antibiotics that are used for treatment in different countries, to ensure that relevant strains and conditions are adopted in the combinations that are tested.

Dr Joanna Bacon

• Organisation: UK Health Security Agency
• Position: Principal Investigator, Discovery Group
• E-mail: joanna.bacon@ukhsa.gov.uk