Publication Details

Category Text Publication
Reference Category Journals
DOI 10.1021/acs.est.9b03236
Document author version
Title (Primary) Sewage from airplanes exhibits high abundance and diversity of antibiotic resistance genes
Author Heß, S.; Kneis, D.; Österlund, T.; Li, B.; Kristiansson, E.; Berendonk, T.U.
Source Titel Environmental Science & Technology
Year 2019
Department FLOEK
Volume 53
Issue 23
Page From 13898
Page To 13905
Language englisch
Supplements https://pubs.acs.org/doi/suppl/10.1021/acs.est.9b03236/suppl_file/es9b03236_si_001.zip
Abstract Airplane sanitary facilities are shared by an international audience. We hypothesized the corresponding sewage to be an extraordinary source of antibiotic-resistant bacteria (ARB) and resistance genes (ARG) in terms of diversity and quantity. Accordingly, we analyzed ARG and ARB in airplane-borne sewage using complementary approaches: metagenomics, quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR), and cultivation. For the purpose of comparison, we also quantified ARG and ARB in the inlets of municipal treatment plants with and without connection to airports. As expected, airplane sewage contained an extraordinarily rich set of mobile ARG, and the relative abundances of genes were mostly increased compared to typical raw sewage of municipal origin. Moreover, combined resistance against third-generation cephalosporins, fluorochinolones, and aminoglycosides was unusually common (28.9%) among Escherichia coli isolated from airplane sewage. This percentage exceeds the one reported for German clinical isolates by a factor of 8. Our findings suggest that airplane-borne sewage can effectively contribute to the fast and global spread of antibiotic resistance.
Persistent UFZ Identifier https://www.ufz.de/index.php?en=20939&ufzPublicationIdentifier=22582
Heß, S., Kneis, D., Österlund, T., Li, B., Kristiansson, E., Berendonk, T.U. (2019):
Sewage from airplanes exhibits high abundance and diversity of antibiotic resistance genes
Environ. Sci. Technol. 53 (23), 13898 - 13905 10.1021/acs.est.9b03236