Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR): From the Environment to Health
A special issue of Microorganisms (ISSN 2076-2607). This special issue belongs to the section "Antimicrobial Agents and Resistance".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 March 2026 | Viewed by 65
Special Issue Editor
Interests: antimicrobial resistance; bacterial evolution; plasmid; horizontal gene transfer; microbial interactions; pathogens; disinfection; surveillance
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a growing global threat to public health, food security, and sustainable development. The emergence and spread of AMR are driven by a complex interplay of microbial adaptation, environmental pressures, and anthropogenic activities. Understanding the evolutionary pathways of AMR—including mutation, horizontal gene transfer, and selective enrichment—and their robust monitoring are critical for predicting resistance trends and informing intervention strategies.
Environmental factors such as chronic exposure to sub-inhibitory concentrations of antibiotics, disinfectants, and pollutants play a key role in shaping the adaptive landscape of resistance. To track these dynamics, advanced monitoring technologies, including quantitative PCR, metagenomic sequencing, resistome profiling, and machine learning analytics, enable comprehensive surveillance across clinical, environmental, and agricultural contexts. These tools allow for the comprehensive surveillance of resistance genes across environmental, clinical, and agricultural settings. However, monitoring must be complemented by effective control technologies. Novel approaches—such as advanced oxidation processes, targeted antimicrobial peptides, nanomaterials, bacteriophages, and resistome-aware water treatment systems—offer promising solutions to reduce the AMR burden at the source. Integrating these tools within One Health frameworks can enable early detection, source identification, and tailored interventions. Coordinated efforts in AMR evolution research, real-time monitoring, and proactive control technologies are essential to contain resistance and safeguard global health and environmental sustainability.
This Special Issue explores the interconnectedness of environmental AMR emergence, monitoring, evolution, and control, drawing on insights from microbiology, environmental engineering, molecular biology, and One Health approaches. It aims to highlight both mechanistic understanding and technological innovations in tracking and mitigating AMR from environmental reservoirs to human exposure. By bridging environmental and health disciplines, we hope to inform more effective surveillance frameworks, regulatory strategies, and sustainable interventions that address AMR at its environmental roots. Topics of particular interest include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Environmental reservoirs, evolution, and transmission pathways of AMR.
- Surveillance strategies and resistome profiling in environmental matrices.
- Bacterial evolution of AMR and virulence traits.
- Innovative control and mitigation strategies for AMR in water, soil, and waste systems.
- One Health frameworks linking environmental AMR to human and animal health.
- Policy, risk assessment, and regulatory perspectives on environmental AMR.
Reviews, original research, and communications will be welcome.
Dr. Zhigang Yu
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Microorganisms is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- antimicrobial resistance (AMR)
- environmental resistome
- horizontal gene transfer
- resistance evolution
- virulence and adaptation
- One Health
- AMR surveillance
- disinfection
- metagenomics
- wastewater-based epidemiology
Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue
- Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
- Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
- Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
- External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
- Reprint: MDPI Books provides the opportunity to republish successful Special Issues in book format, both online and in print.
Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.
