The Department of Comparative Biomedicine and Food Science (BCA) of the University of Padova seeks project ideas to join and support as partner!

With particular reference to the call HORIZON-CL6-2027-01-BIODIV-07, the research activities involve a multidisciplinary team.

The integrated research area brings together expertise in molecular epidemiology, environmental microbiology and advanced analytical chemistry. The team includes senior academic staff, early‑career researchers, PhD students and specialized technical personnel.

Activities focus on the molecular epidemiology of bacteria of animal and environmental origin, with particular attention to zoonotic pathogens and antimicrobial resistance.

Current work includes participation in the EUPAHW initiative, contributing to surveillance, characterization and risk assessment of emerging microbial threats in a One Health framework. A complementary research line investigates the uptake and metabolism of human and veterinary pharmaceuticals in various plant species, using advanced liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry (LC‑MS) methods.

This work supports the assessment of environmental contamination pathways and the fate of pharmaceutical compounds across ecosystems.

Together, these competencies enable integrated analyses of microbial risk, contaminant exposure and ecosystem health.

 Key areas of interest include:

• Applying a One Health perspective to predict the impact of existing and emerging stressors (e.g., contaminants, pathogens, antimicrobial agents) on ecosystems and human/animal health.

• Investigating pathogen spillover dynamics, antimicrobial resistance evolution and ecosystem‑level health risks.

• Expanding research on the fate, uptake and transformation of pharmaceuticals and related metabolites in biological systems (animals, plants, environmental matrices).

 Future activities would include combining microbiological and analytical‑chemical approaches to study interactions between environmental contaminants, microbial communities and resistance development under realistic exposure scenarios.

Potential synergies involve collaboration with groups working on:

• environmental health and monitoring,

• antibiotic‑residue analysis,

• aquatic and terrestrial ecosystem physiology,

• antimicrobial resistance risk assessment.