Progress 01/15/24 to 01/14/25
Outputs
Target Audience:Environmental Scientists, Engineers, Landowners who apply manure and install conservation practices, watershed managers, farmers (livestock and crop), state agents Changes/Problems:Detection of antibiotics from grab samples collected in the Black Hawk Lake and Shell Creek watersheds has generally been low and so deployed POCIS samplers to the watersheds in 2024. Antimicrobials are being extracted by the Water Sciences Laboratory at University of Nebraska - Lincoln and then will be submitted to researchers at University of Buffalo for analysis. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Training was also provided to Moriah Brown, PhD student in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Moriah completed her MS in May 2024 related to this project.Training was also provided to Shoaib Ahmed, PhD student in Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering at Iowa State University. Both students traveled to the USDA ARS labs in Temple, Texas to train on SWAT modeling and work wiht Dr. Jeff Arnold to activate the bacteria module in SWAT + and to develop a strategy for model improvement. Jaber Ghorbani (PhD student in Food Science and Technology at UNL) participated in a practical machine learning course (ECEN-478) during Fall 2024, which enhanced his proficiency in data manipulation and supported his work in risk assessment modeling. Additionally, he is scheduled to attend a Proteomics workshop offered by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in January 2025 to further expand his expertise. During the reporting period 1 PhD student (Nafisa Lubna) and 2 undergraduate students (Jillian Bailey and Alexis Sampson) developed or refined STEM communication skills by contributing to the development and distribution of educational materials for the iAMResponsible social networks and educational library. The continued expansion of media development by the iAMResponsible team has required team members Bethany Zelt and Mara Zelt to develop new expertise in video production, audio production, and graphic design, utilizing programs such as Canva, and the Adobe Creative Suite, and database management capacity in Airtable. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?At the 2024 AGU conference, Shoaib Ahmed presented two poster presentations summarizing monitoring of AMR in the Black Hawk Lake watershed and statistical tools to assess relationships between water quality and environmental parameters. At the IAFP-2024 Conference, we presented our research titled "Risk Ranking of Antibiotic Resistance Genes on Human Health". Our work garnered significant attention and received prestigious award (Top two in Modelling and Risk Analysis (MRA) PDG at IAFP), highlighting its impact and innovation in the field. This platform enabled us to engage with academics, industry professionals, and policymakers, fostering meaningful discussions and obtaining valuable feedback. These interactions have been instrumental in further refining our approach, enhancing the effectiveness and applicability of our risk assessment model. The CAMRADES project is partnered with the iAMResponsible team to amplify knowledge gained from this project to larger audiences in the iAMR project network. To that end, the iAMResponsible Project has six primary online (TikTok added Nov 2024) outlets for the regular distribution of newly developed outreach and educational materials with a total audience of almost 6000 (5,792 as of 12/17/2024). During the reporting period audiences interacting with these digital platforms engaged (liked, shared, viewed video, or followed link) with iAMResponsible materials on more than 12,000 (12,556) occasions. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Objective 1: Now that two years of data collection are completed, we will focus on SWAT model development to predict the novement of antibiotics and ARG in the Shell Creek watershed in Nebraska and Black Hawk Lake watershed in Iowa. We will continue analyzing antimicrobial and related compounds in water samples collected from Black Hawk and Shell Creek Lakes. We will also explore additional compounds that may induce AMR transfer by exhibiting bacterial toxicity, including pesticides, organofluorine compounds, and pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs). The results of these analyses will be used to evaluate additional microchemical-AMR interactions to strengthen the CAMRADES framework and overall understanding of the drivers behind AMR dissemination. Objective 2: Our focus during the next year will be SWAT development and testing, which is essential to the integrated CAMRADES framework. Objective 3: Following the completion of hazard characterization for ARGs, our next step involves assessing human exposure to these genes. The exposure assessment will consider multiple routes to link ARG contamination in water environments to human exposure, primarily through ingestion. These routes include accidental ingestion during recreational swimming, drinking water treated from surface water, and consumption of leafy greens irrigated with surface water. We plan to conduct several systematic reviews to determine the presence and levels of ARGs and the impact of factors influencing contamination along these exposure pathways. The data gathered will be used to develop exposure assessment models that estimate human exposure levels to ARGs. These models will be integrated with the hazard characterization risk scores to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the human health risks associated with ARG contamination. In addition to assessing human health impacts, we will also evaluate the ecological effects of the presence of human and veterinary antibiotics in water environments. As more data on antibiotics are collected from various watersheds, we will evaluate the ecological risk quotient (ERQ) of these antibiotics across different locations and seasons. This assessment will help determine the risks these pollutants pose to aquatic organisms.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Objective 1: A second year of field data was collected in the Shell Creek watershed in Nebraska and Black Hawk Lake in Iowa. Samples were collected May through November for antibiotics, antibiotic resistant bacteria and genes. In this year, passive samples (POCIS) were deployed to evaluate low level antibiotics in the watershed. We detected veterinary antimicrobials including monensin, erythromycin, sulfamethizole, sulfamethoxazole, sulfadimethoxine, azithromycin, tiamulin, narasin, clarithromycin, roxithromycin, and 4-epichlortetracycline in Black Hawk Lake at levels ranging from 0.2-36.5 ng/L. Monensin, erythromycin, tylosin, tiamulin, and azithromicin were also detected in Shell Creek Lake at levels ranging from 0.1-285 ng/L. DNA extraction is ongoing and preliminary qPCR runs have been completed. Researchers traveled to the USDA ARS labs in Temple, Texas to train on SWAT modeling, and in specific, to work with Jeff Arnold on development of an AMR module.The results of these analyses will be utilized to develop the CAMRADES framework. Objective 3:As a key component of the human health risk assessment, we conducted a hazard characterization step to evaluate and quantify the impact of Antibiotic Resistance Genes (ARGs) on human health. To assess the health impact and determine the risk score of water samples influenced by agricultural practices, we first needed to establish a comprehensive framework that facilitates the incorporation of genomic information. Research was conducted using available genomics data from the NCBI and PATRIC databases, and statistical analysis and metadata were employed to extract information about resistance genes. Four criteria were established for the genes, and a risk score for each gene was assigned based on country-specific information. Experts from various fields were then asked to weight these criteria through a survey, drawing on their specialized knowledge. The survey methodology was adapted from the WHO's approach to ranking antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The survey was conducted over a one-month period between April and June 2024. Once the criteria weights were determined, the genes were ranked based on their attributed scores (ranging from 0 to 1). The developed model was further validated by assessing water samples which were anticipated to exhibit varying risk scores, based on the abundance and risk scores of ARGs. This validation utilized metagenomics data from various water sources, including seawater, river water, lake water, wastewater treatment plants, and hospital wastewater. The full manuscript is under internal review. The iAMResponsible team partnered with student groups based in Monrovia, Liberia and Lincoln, NE (USA) to plan, promote, and conduct three community outreach events to introduce AMR health risks and potential interventions to youth audiences (ages 4 to 18). The iAMResponsible Team's role in these events was to develop educational materials and provide guidance and training to the student-leaders both about AMR and in delivering STEM youth programming. More than 350 students participated in one or more of these student-led events. Student participants were highly engaged on this topic, most said they had improved their awareness of AMR (92%) and that they planned to explore the topic further (84%) through higher education, research, or advocacy. Student-leaders were also positively impacted by the programs as teaching further improved their own understanding of AMR and deepened their commitment on the issue, 11% of student-leaders said they learned something new about AMR through leading the event(s) and 35% intended to expand their awareness efforts in their personal networks. Survey questions were integrated into Manure Applicator Training programs in Iowa to assess producer and certified applicators' knowledge of antimicrobial resistance and exposure pathways.
Publications
- Type:
Other Journal Articles
Status:
Submitted
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Ahmed, S., Abdullah Azzam, Richa Babbar, Michelle Soupir, 2025. A comparative study of SWAT and SWAT+ model for simulating streamflow in a tile-drained agricultural watershed. Journal of Hydrologic Engineering
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Jaber Ghorbani, Yanbin Yin, Xu Li, Jennifer Clarke, Adina Howe, Michelle Soupir, Amy Schmidt, Shannon Bartelt-Hunt, Bing Wang, 2024. Risk Ranking of Antibiotic-Resistance Genes on Human Health. International Association for Food Protection (Long Beach, CA)
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Nafisa Lubna, Mark Burback, Amy Schmidt. Integrating Natural Resource Management Strategies in Antimicrobial Resistance Education and Prevention. NIAMRRE Annual Conference
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Nafisa Lubna, Mark Burback, Amy Schmidt. Integrating Natural Resource Management Strategies in Antimicrobial Resistance Education and Prevention. ASABE-AIM 2024
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Hector Palala-Martinez, Mara Zelt, Bethany Zelt, Maria Jose Oviedo-Ventura, Amy Schmidt. Empowering Youth to Create a Healthier Future Through STEM Education About Antimicrobial Resistance. ASEE Annual Conference
- Type:
Other
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Schmidt, A., Engineering Sustainability at the Nexus of Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Communities from a One Health Perspective. Presented at: Veterinary Public Health, UNL
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Moriah Brown, Shannon L. Bartelt-Hunt. Watershed Monitoring of Shell Creek for Antibiotics and Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria. Presented at Nebraska Water Conference.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Moriah Brown, Shannon Bartelt-Hunt, Moushumi Hazra, Meredith Sutton, Evelyn Reyes and Kayleigh Caulder. Watershed Monitoring of Shell Creek to Determine Spatial and Seasonal Variations in Microplastic Concentrations of an Agriculturally Dominant Watershed. AGU 2024
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Damalka Balasuriya, Shoaib Ahmed, Timothy Neher, Leigh A. Long, Mindula Wijayahena, Joshua S. Wallace, Adina Howe, Michelle Soupir, Diana S. Aga. Determination of Chemical Pollutants as Drivers for Antimicrobial Resistance in an Agricultural Watershed Presented at: 7th Environmental Dimension of Antimicrobial Resistance Conference?(EDAR7).
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Damalka Balasuriya, Liezel Abaya, Shoaib Ahmed, Leigh A. Long, Judith Cristobal, Alyssa Warrior, Shannon Seneca, Joshua S. Wallace, Adina Howe, Michelle Soupir, Diana S. Aga. Determination of Chemical Pollutants in the Environment as Potential Drivers of Antimicrobial Resistance. Presented at: University at Buffalo CAS Spotlight Symposium.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Ahmed, S., M.L. Soupir. 2024. Understanding the Environmental Determinants of Antimicrobial Resistance Export in Agricultural Watersheds: A Comprehensive Multivariate Analysis. AGU, Washington D.C. 12/9/24 12/13/24.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2024
Citation:
Ahmed, S., M.L. Soupir. 2024. Impact of Agricultural Antibiotics on Agroecosystems: Insights from SWAT+ Modeling. AGU, Washington D.C. 12/9/24 12/13/24.
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Progress 01/15/23 to 01/14/24
Outputs
Target Audience:Environmental Scientists, Engineers, Landowners who apply manure and install conservation practices, watershed managers, farmers (livestock and crop), state agents Changes/Problems:Detection of antibiotics has been infrequent and thus the team is considering adding passive samplers to select sites in the BHL and Shell Creek Watersheds. Samplers would be deployed for 2 week time periods and then extracted and sent to UB for analysis. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?We currently have four graduate students involved with this project, 1 at Iowa State University, 2 at UNL, and 1 University of Buffalo. The students have been trained on field and laboratory methods related to data collection and analysis, leading or assisting with field data collection and laboratory analysis, and modeling. All graduate students attend the project meetings with PIs. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Primary dissemination for the iAMResponsible team has been via social media, and other online publications, in course materials, and at professional, educational, and community events. A student presented the calibration results of SWAT+ model when compared to the lumped version of SWAT at the ASABE meeting in summer 2023. We are currently working to develop additional materials for dissemination to farmers in 2024. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?The teams as ISU, UNL, and UB will continue data collection, refining laboratory methods, and testing and modifying the SWAT+ model for prediction of AMR in watersheds. In 2024 we will be potentially deploying passive samplers to identify low levels of antibiotics present in the watershed. Target genes will be finalized and samples analyzed for resistant genes using qPCR. The SWAT model of the BHL and Shell Creek watersheds will continue to be tested and calibrated. For the Risk Assessment, multi-decision-criteria approach will be applied for determining the weight of each criterion. Once the abundance of genes determined in the surveillance part, the risk index of each sample will be determined incorporating the severity and the abundance of corresponding ARG. Looking further ahead, we will continue to include the severity to provide a risk assessment sheet including relevant questions that are likely to increase or decrease the risk for user applications. During the next reporting period the iAMResponsible team will continue to expand our content library to incorporate and make accessible research findings from a wider selection of contributors and expand our content creation to new media types and delivery methods. We will present Livestock and Poultry Environmental Learning Community (LPELC) webinars covering treatment of manure, fate and transport of AMR (in the environment), and risk assessment advancements. Three students will be presenting research talks or posters at upcoming professional conferences (ASEE, EDAR, and IAFP).
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Supporting Objective 1. Characterize and predict transport of AMR targets via surface and subsurface pathways in agro-ecosystems. Characterization of antimicrobial targets at the Black Hawk Lake and Shell Creek Watersheds continued this year. Monitoring in the Black Hawk Lake (BHL) Watershed began in March and ended in November 2023.Sample collection and processing went as scheduled, i.e., every two weeks, with added sampling for storm events. In Iowa, this year was classified as dry when compared to the 30-year average and continues a drought period that since the initiation of the project. A total of 65 samples were collected from BHL sites, of which 61 were biweekly baseflow, and 4 were storm samples. All samples were processed for antibiotics, bacteria, and DNA. The Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for antibiotic processing was updated and collaborators are continuing to work to improve antibiotic recovery. Following the updated SOPs, samples for antibiotics were processed through solid-phase extraction and shipped to the University at Buffalo (UB) for further processing. Total and resistant bacteria from water samples were grown on the selective agar, and DNA on filters was preserved in DNA bead tubes, stored at -80°C. Collaborators held multiple online meetings this year to keep track of the progress. Results of bacteria and antibiotics analysis for 2022 and 2023 were presented and discussed during the end-of-the-year meeting and uploaded to the common project database. SWAT+ models of BHL and Shell Creek watersheds was developed in the past year. The BHL site model was successfully calibrated for simulating water quantity and efforts are ongoing to calibrate water quality. A conference presentation of this model was made at the ASABE Annual International Meeting in July 2023. The model is currently undergoing nutrient and bacteria calibration, after which the team will move toward calibrating the model for antibiotics. Improve knowledge of AMR-related risks and inspire adoption of practices among food producers to combat AMR-related health and food safety risks associated with agro-ecosystems. To create a risk assessment model in line with Objective 3, we began by reviewing existing literature and identified four distinct criteria for assessing the severity of each Antibiotic Resistance Gene (ARG). These criteria include gene mobility, human accessibility (the gene's presence in various environments), pathogenicity (its presence in human pathogens), and resistance to clinically important antibiotics. We collaborated with Dr. Nielsen from the University of Copenhagen to obtain mobility data for genes, which had previously been extracted in a separate study. Ongoing work is on evaluation of the presence of genes in different environments using metagenomics information from accessible datasets.
Publications
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Accepted
Year Published:
2023
Citation:
Ahmed, S., S. Azzam, A. Syed, M.L. Soupir. 2023. Comparison between SWAT and SWAT+ for simulating streamflow in a small, heavily tile -drained agricultural watershed. ASABE Annual International Meeting in Omaha, NE. 7/9 7/12/2023.
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Progress 01/15/22 to 01/14/23
Outputs
Target Audience:Environmental Scientists, Engineers, Landowners who apply manure and install conservation practices, watershed managers, farmers (livestock and crop), state agents Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?We currently have fourteen studentsstudents involved with this project, 3 at Iowa State University, 10 at UNL, and 1University of Buffalo. The students have been trained on field and laboratory methods related to data collection and analysis, leading or assisting with field data collection and laboratory analysis, and modeling. All graduate students attend the project meetings with PIs.During the reporting period 1 PhD student, 2 masters students, and 4 undergraduate students developed or refined STEM communication skills by contributing to the development and distribution of educational materials for the iAMResponsible networks. The continued expansion of media development by the iAMResponsible team has also required several team members to develop new expertise in video production, audio production, and graphic design, utilizing programs such as Canva, and the Adobe Creative Suite, among others. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Primary dissemination for the iAMResponsible team has been via social media, and other online publications, in course materials, and at professional, educational, and community events. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?During the next reporting period the iAMResponsible team will continue to expand our content library to incorporate and make accessible research findings from a wider selection of contributors and expand our content creation to new media types and delivery methods. The teams as ISU, UNL, and UB will continue data collection, refining laboratory methods, and testing and modifying the SWAT+ model for prediction of AMR in watersheds.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Characterize and predict transport of AMR targets via surface and subsurface pathways in agro-ecosystems. Characterization of antimicrobial targets at the Black Hawk Lake and Shell Creek Watershed began this year. Monitoring in the Black Hawk Lake (BHL) Watershed began in March and ended in November 2022. Samples were collected every two weeks and during storm events. A total of 98 samples were collected at sites within the BHL monitoring network. Of the samples collected, 65 were at base flow and 21 at elevated storm flows. Monitoring in the Shell Creek Watershed began in October and included one sampling event at base flow. Each sample collected from this year was processed for antibiotics, bacteria, and DNA within 24 hours. The collected water samples underwent solid phase extraction (SPE) at Iowa State University (ISU) before SPE cartridges were then individually wrapped in aluminum foil and shipped on ice to University at Buffalo (UB) for further analysis. Bacteria from the water samples were grown on selective agar to measure total and resistant fecal indicator bacteria. Finally, the water was filtered for DNA and the filters were stored at -80°C until subsequent DNA extraction for antibiotic resistance gene quantification. To improve synergistic performance across institutions, collaborators from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) toured the BHL watershed in August where the Iowa State University hosts shared their field and laboratory protocols. Additionally, the ISU collaborators toured the Shell Creek Watershed in October.Historic data of the BHL watershed was revisited, conditioned and a common data space was setup. Observed data collected from this year was acquired, formatted and made available in the project database. Database sharing modalities between ISU and UNL are being discussed and a platform will be selected for rapid data sharing. Integrate results into a novel adaptable framework (CAMRADES) to assess risk associated with transport of AMR through agricultural environments to humans as a result of agricultural practices. ISU also initiated modeling of the BHL watershed on SWAT+. Datasets like the DEM, climatic variables, soil and landcover to be used in modeling (other than the observed water quality and quantity) were explored for simulating BHL watershed on SWAT+. The model is currently under the calibration phase at a sub watershed level. Improve knowledge of AMR-related risks and inspire adoption of practices among food producers to combat AMR-related health and food safety risks associated with agro-ecosystems. The iAMResponsible team works to translate and transfer new research findings for delivery to the target audiences. Over 50 new pieces of outreach content were created during the reporting period for distribution on social media and added to the existing database of media and research related to AMR curated by the iAMResponsible team and available to the public on the Livestock and Poultry Environmental Learning Community (LPELC) website. Four on-line social media outlets for dissemination of AMR related materials are managed with regular (monthly, weekly, or daily) outputs. In partnership with LPELC the project team delivered the fourth in an ongoing series of webinars on AMR impacts on agriculture aimed at agricultural producers and their advisors. In early 2022, the iAMResponsible team launched a podcast series (Tales of the Resistance), to discuss research findings on AMR in food production systems with general (non-expert audiences). The iAMResponsible team is also leading a multi-university online course "AMR from a One Health Perspective" which explores the many faceted challenges of AMR with emphasis on developing scientific communication skills in young STEM professionals. During the Spring of 2022, twenty students at six universities (Nebraska, Maryland, North Carolina State, Washington State, Oklahoma State, and Minnesota) participated in the course.
Publications
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