Joaquim Viñes is currently an industrial Ph.D. student under the mentorship of Dr. Olga Francino and Dr. Anna Cuscó, between Vetgenomics, a veterinary genetic diagnostics company, and the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. The focus of his research is applying sequencing techniques to study antimicrobial resistance and virulence in potential zoonotic microorganisms, such as Staphylococcus pseudintermedius and Escherichia coli in a One-Health approach.

Colistin is a last resort antibiotic in human medicine. Under the umbrella of One-Health, we applied whole-genome sequencing to unravel the transmission of colistin resistance from livestock to the farmer on a mixed farm. Multidrug-resistant Escherichia coli isolated from pigs, calves, and a farmer also carried several virulence genes, such as Shiga-toxin or cytolethal distending toxin. Colistin resistance was due to the mcr-1 gene, carried on plasmids (IncX4, lncI2, and lncHl2) or the chromosome. Human IncX4 plasmid was most likely acquired from cattle (99.97% identity; 99.99% coverage). Livestock is a reservoir of plasmids with resistance genes concerning human health.

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