HACKING BACTERIA & NEUTRALISING ANTIBIOTIC RESISTANCE

Bacteria Contamination?

We breathe in about 11,000 liters (7 to 8 liters per minute) of Air daily. Of this, inhaled Air is 20% oxygen, and exhaled Air is 15% oxygen. The balance of 5% is converted to carbon dioxide. At the same time, we also inhale contamination. The Goliath of covid virus has created mass awareness of the presence of contaminants in the Air, which can?adversely affect our?health.?

Airborne bacterial and fungal cells and spores may be present in droplets as bioaerosols, as individual microscopic particles that stay suspended for long periods, or, depending upon the moisture content that forms larger clusters, aggregates settle rapidly onto surfaces. They are an important source of infection in medical facilities and can contaminate sensitive manufacturing operations.

In 1928, Sir Alexander Fleming triggered the beginning of the modern era of antibiotics by inventing Penicillin. The revolutionary medicine saved lives and increased life expectancy. The euphoric mistake and presumption were that all infectious diseases could be successfully controlled with antibiotics. However, during the past few decades, the imprudent and excessive use (underuse, overuse, and misuse) of antibiotics regrettably led to the rapid emergence and propagation of bacterial strains resistant to virtually all therapeutically useful antibiotics. Antimicrobial / Antibiotic resistance is one of the most worrying threats to humankind. Infections caused by antibiotic resistance pathogens are difficult and sometimes impossible to treat. These biological mechanisms learn by attempting?to outsmart/overcome the antibiotics and other medicines meant to kill them.

Microbiological (Airborne bacteria and fungi) real-time monitoring of the Air in pharmaceuticals, office buildings, aircraft, railways, ships, laboratories, clean rooms, cosmetics, health care facilities, prisons, food supply chains, restaurants, and other prominent gathering places (auditorium, theatre, etc) is essential. It is a regulatory requirement in most countries, and international standards have been published for biocontamination control in cleanrooms and other controlled environments (ISO 14698-1/2).?

Limitations in monitoring and controlling the contamination.?

Monitoring air contamination in space has always been a challenge. The current technologies used in clinical microbiology to identify the bacterial agent and profile antimicrobial susceptibility are time-consuming and frequently expensive. Conventional monitoring of airborne bacteria, viruses, and fungi methods like Biological, Biochemical, Molecular, or Chemical is not real-time. The random sample volume of Air is taken periodically. It’s a stroke of luck by chance if one can capture the bacteria in the Air. Monitoring is associated with using consumables for collecting samples, Incubating, waiting for microbial growth to occur, discriminating the type, and colony counting. This complete process takes 3 to 5 days. Until sterilization/fumigation is done in the space, the ignominious gram-negative bacteria would spread, infect and do severe damage. As a result, physicians prescribe empirical antimicrobial therapies. This scenario is often the cause of therapeutic failures, causing higher mortality rates and healthcare costs, as well as the emergence and spread of antibiotic resistant bacteria. In the last few decades, viral and bacterial pathogens have become a real menace to human safety.

One of the ways to combat the spread of antimicrobial resistance is to work towards the development of accurate diagnostic technologies, which ideally should simultaneously perform the identification of the pathogen agent and the antibiotic susceptibility profiling in a second-to-minute timeframe.?

Hacking the Bacteria?

Photonic Sensing technology is a breakthrough methodology to monitor in situ (real-time) Bacteria, viruses, fungi, and all types of harmful pathogens in the Air. The product namely AUM_Bio Surveillance can scan the complete space as the light beam travels across with available line of sight and detects, discriminates, and quantifies microbes in Air. AUM_Bio Surveillance is a powerful monitoring device that can make the detection process of important clinical bacteria and virus to be easy, quick, and effective by sensing relevant parameters that can be related to infectious processes. Hence it counters the limitation of conventional systems:?

·????????Monitoring in real-time,

·????????Scanning 24*7*365 every meter of the space, with high sampling frequency.

·????????Identifies the geolocation

·????????Validated Bacterial and Fungi library.

·????????No Retesting is required and hence saving time.

·????????Reduced dependence on outside service.?

AUM Bio Surveillance currently detects the following bacteria that generally lead to 80% of Hospital Acquired Infection:?

Additional Pathogens can be easily added to the library without changing the primary hardware. Hence the complete system saves on Capex as well as Opex.

AUM Bio Surveillance also monitors 15 pollutant gases, including voc, particulate matter, and met parameters.

• Thermal Comfort?????????????????????????????????????????????????????
• Temperature,
• Relative Humidity,
• Air Speed, Flow and Direction
• Pollutants
• NH3, CO2 , CO, O3, NOx Sox , etc.
• Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) Any Particles less than 1mm in diameter
• Particulate Material (PM 2.5 / PM 10)

AUM Bio Surveillance earmarks as a complete monitoring device in real-time detecting, discriminating, and quantifying pathogens, bacteria, viruses, fungi, pollutants, particulate matter, etc. Hence providing the following benefit to humankind:

·????????Suppress the growth of mold and bacteria, which prevents virus and mold propagation?

·????????Suppress the mold stains and odor on the inside of the indoor unit

·????????Assessment and Prediction of the likelihood of occurrence.

·????????Identification of measures for prevention or control.

·????????Selection and Corrective actions at Potentially high-risk zones.

·????????Establishment of limits.

AUM Bio Surveillance will perform rapid identification and profiling of the pathogen. The rapid identification will be a top priority task to prevent an outbreak that represents a high risk of disruption of the healthcare system and a disastrous socio-economic impact.

Neutralizing Antimicrobial / Antibiotic resistance

AUM Bio Surveillance marriage with CATSMART Big Data platform will disrupt existing societal norms. AUM Bio Surveillance will be able to simulate and replicate the behavior of pathogens and establish their source. Once a living system’s behavior has been replicated on computers, the technology will progress to deep learn to decode the nature.?Like humans, atoms, cells, species, pathogens, etc. interacting with their environment train themselves from time to time to perform better. With due research, CATSMART Big data and deep learning will predict the nature in which each of these entities uses its surrounding environment.?

Bacteria are learning, mutating, and attempting to get resistant to antibiotics. Once the profile change of bacteria is captured using the AUM Bio Surveillance and CATS SMART big data analytical platform, real-time genetic mapping will begin. Thus, scientists can establish appropriate medication by continually monitoring the mutation pattern of bacteria by AUM Bio Surveillance.

Thus, in the near future the real-time identification and profiling of susceptible bacteria and viruses’ infection will be significant in targeting successful therapy. WHO has suggested that global research should focus on developing new diagnostic and therapeutic tools for antibiotic-resistant pathogens like Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Enterococcus faecium. AUM Bio Surveillance qualifies and quantifies these variants of bacteria and also built there mutants profile.

Thus, distinguishing between resistance, tolerance, and persistence to antibiotic treatments would also represent a significant breakthrough. Deep learning will help model a patient’s biological system and develop customized therapeutics. Photonic Sensing Technology is a blessing for a healthier world.?