Project description
Exploring plastic’s impact on gut microbes
Plastic pollution poses a severe risk to human health, yet its impact on the gut microbiome (GM) remains largely unexplored. Crucial for human health, GM adapts to environmental changes, but increased plastic exposure could disrupt its balance. With the support of Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions programme, the plasticOME project aims to fill this research gap by investigating how plastics affect GM diversity and function. By analysing the prevalence of plastic-degrading microbes and their functions in human guts, plasticOME seeks to identify new microbes capable of breaking down plastics. This project blends microbiome research with plastics science, potentially uncovering novel methods for mitigating plastic pollution and advancing our understanding of gut health.
Objective
The gut microbiome (GM) is essential to human health and its dynamics allow for compositional and functional changes, giving it the potential to help hosts to adapt to rapidly changing environments. Although there is growing concern and public pressure to understand the impacts of increased plastic pollution on human health, a detailed assessment of this xenobiotic’s impacts on GMs is a major gap in research that this proposal seeks to bridge. I hypothesize that given (a) human exposure to plastics began very late in human evolution at the turn of the 20th century, (b) this exposure is ever increasing, and (c) preliminary results from my previous research show associations between plastic ingestion and changes in GM diversity and compositions, then plastics likely play a role in shaping GMs and their functions in modern humans. I aim to test this hypothesis by (1) determining the prevalence of plastic-degrading (PD) microbes and functions across modern GMs in order to (2) validate and characterize in vitro a subset of candidate gut microbes’ capacity for previously unidentified PD to finally (3) investigate plastics as a modulator of modern GMs. This will unveil unexplored factors behind the evolution of human gut microbiomes that could lead to the discovery of new plastic degrading microbes relevant for plastic pollution remediation strategies. This project takes an unconventional and multidisciplinary approach by exploiting advances in microbiome research encompassing bioinformatic tools and databases, applying these to the plastics field, and targeting humans. By building on my existing skills in wildlife and microbial ecology and plastics research and expanding them into human and computational metagenomics (strengths of the host), I am confident that plasticOME will enhance my academic profile at the unique crossroad between metagenomics and plastics research, allowing me to grow into an independent group leader.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- natural sciences computer and information sciences databases
- natural sciences biological sciences ecology
- natural sciences earth and related environmental sciences environmental sciences pollution
- natural sciences biological sciences microbiology
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European Fellowships
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) HORIZON-MSCA-2023-PF-01
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
38122 Trento
Italy
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.