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New funding to study airborne antibiotic resistant microbes

Program news Professors

May 28, 2020

The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) is pleased to announce $4 million in funding for a team led by Dr. Caroline Duchaine of Université Laval to study the spread of antibiotic resistance through airborne microbes in the environment. The new funding is provided through NSERC's Discovery Frontiers program. The researchers will explore how antibiotic resistance spreads through airborne microbes in a range of environments across Canada, from arctic tundra and forests to dairies, fish farms, and swine abattoirs. In addition to developing techniques and procedures to identify and monitor these microbes, Dr. Duchaine and her colleagues will train a cadre of young scientists who will pursue careers in this field as well as in agriculture, industry, health care, and environmental protection.

“This investment will support some of Canada’s best researchers, with Dr. Duchaine in particular recognized as a leader in her field. I congratulate her and her colleagues in putting together such a strong interdisciplinary team. This research has the potential to make a real difference in a wide variety of applications.”
– Alejandro Adem, NSERC President