The AWARE Team

Prof. Dr. Ana Maria de Roda Husman has over 20 years of experience as a principal investigator in environmental infectious diseases. She advises policy makers at the Dutch government, the European committee, and a.o. WHO, ECDC, and EFSA on the possible public health risks from exposure to human pathogens in water, soil and air, and possible intervention measures. She has published over 120 peer-reviewed papers in scientific journals, and several book chapters, reviews and reports. She directs infectious disease research and policy advice at the dept. of Environment at the Dutch Center of Infectious Disease Control of the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment. She holds the chair of Global changes and environmentally transmitted infectious diseases at the Institute for Risk Assessment Sciences of Utrecht University e.g. educating on average 6-7 PhD students. She has served as an expert for WHO since 2004 for the revision of the Guidelines for Drinking Water Quality, and is director of the WHO Collaborating Center for Risk Assessment of Pathogens in Food and Water. She was appointed in the Dutch Soil Protection Technical Committee since 2013. She has coordinated several European networks and (sub)projects (FP5-7, H2020, COST) with respect to environmental infectious diseases e.g. VSS, Virobathe, Vital, BlueHealth.

Ana Maria de Roda Husman has been involved in estimating health risks from exposure to AMR in the environment for over ten years and aided the WHO Global Action Plan on AMR in relation to WaSH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene). She contributed to setting AMR research agendas with a.o. WHO and at the national level.

Prof. Dr. Carmen Chifiriuc is the Principal investigator of six national projects and team member of 33 research grants (4 international – FP7, ERANET, PHARE). She is the main author/co-author of 14 books (including “Antibiotics and Antimicrobial chimiotherapeutics” – Romanian Academy Publish. House), >200 papers (Hirsh index 19). She is also the coordinator or member in the scientific and organizing committee of eight international workshops and conferences, has been invited as plenary speaker in six international conferences and workshops; she is a member in the Editorial Board of 5 Romanian journals, indexed in international databases; Guest editor for special issues in Current Organic Chemistry; Current Medicinal Chemistry ; Current Topics in Medicinal Chemistry) and evaluator of national and international research proposals.

Phenotypic and genotypic investigation of antibiotic resistance (AR) and virulence markers in clinical and environmental strains. Assessment of the microbicidal/microbiostatic/anti-pathogenic activity of new chemical compounds, probiotics, vegetal extracts, nanocomposites. UB included in the team a WWTP technology expert. Dr. Costel Bumbac is a Biotechnology Engineer with experience in environmental biotechnologies, development of innovative processes of water treatment, drinking water and soil bioremediation. He was involved in 42 research projects and has 5 patents in these fields. During the present project he will offer consultancy regarding the most appropriate selection of WWTPs in order to assess the efficiency of different WWTP treatment technologies in the removal/decrease of ARB.

Prof. Dr. Joakim Larsson is a professor of environmental pharmacology, and the Director of the Centre for Antibiotic Research (CARe) funded by UGOT. He has published 107 peer review publications and book chapters. According to google scholar, these have been cited 5316 times (Hirsch Index 37) Out of his 20 most cited papers, he is first or last author on 17, demonstrating a leading role. Professor Larsson is a laureate of the Swedish Young Fernström prize, and he is the principal investigator for numerous grants related to the current topic, including “NoCURE“ on Novel Carbapenemases – unravelling the environmental resistome; a regional ALF-funding on ’Resistance surveillance via analyses of hospital effluent’; INTERACT, on ’The interaction of metals and biocides with the selection of antibiotic-resistant bacteria’; and a FORMAS/SCR project on ’The role of antibiotics in the environment for the emergence, selection and transfer of antibiotic resistance’. Over the past 10 years, he has been principal investigator for projects funded with more than 12.5 million € and co-applicant for projects funded with an additional 23 million €, providing ample experience in project management. He has supervised 10 PhD students to dissertation (+4 ongoing) and has been main mentor for 18 postdocs and researchers. His current research group is comprised of 15 people with 3 additional recruitments ongoing. The center he leads (CARe) includes more than 80 researchers. He frequently serves as reviewer for both Swedish and international funding bodies, including FORMAS, and he serves on the editorial board for several journals and on the Swedish advisory board for JPI- AMR. He dedicates much time to interactions with stakeholders in the water and health sector. As examples of dissemination of research results to and education of the general public, he has contributed to about 10 documentary films, been on national TV/radio 16 times the past few years, given a TEDx-talk and helped journalists write several hundred articles about his research.

Prof. Dr. Katja Radon is an occupational and environmental epidemiologist with almost 20 years of experience in the field. She is director of the Center for International Health @ LMU (www.cih.lmu.de), funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. She has coordinated several EU studies (European farmers project (BMH1- CT94 – 1554); NetWoRM project (135281-LLP-1-2007-1-DE-KA4MP) and is/has been involved as a national partner in a number of EU projects (e.g., Geronimo, MobiKids, GA2LEN). Nationally, she is currently coordinating studies funded by federal ministries, ministries of federal states, foundations, and enterprises. She has (co-)authored more than 150 peer-reviewed publications.

Katja Radon has been involved in and coordinated a large number of occupational and environmental epidemiological projects, e.g. a study on the effects of concentrated animal feeding operations on respiratory health and prevalence of MRSA in neighboring residents, and the European Farmers study.