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Ribo-regulators that sense trace antibiotics

Objective

Over-usage of antibiotics in the clinic and in agriculture resulted not only in increased drug resistance among pathogenic bacteria, but also in the spread of antibiotics metabolites in the environment and in our food. This poses multiple significant threats, including the development and expansion of multi-drug resistant pathogens.

The health and safety risks imposed by the presence of antibiotics in food, drinking water, and environmental waters raise the strong necessity for continuous monitoring of trace antibiotics levels in multiple media. The EU now obliges food manufacturers to test for antibiotics traces in their products, but current technologies for antibiotics sensing do not provide a complete solution. There is a strong need for antibiotics sensors that would accurately, rapidly and inexpensively report on the presence of antibiotics in various environments.

In our ERC-StG project we discovered new RNA leaders (ribo-regulators) that sense very low concentrations of antibiotics, leading to the activation of antibiotics resistance genes. These ribo-regulators thus function as efficient antibiotics sensors. Within the current PoC project we will develop a prototype for a highly sensitive bio-sensor, capable of rapid detection of trace levels of multiple antibiotics in food, water and other substances in a cost-effective manner.

Our PoC project involves both prototype development and business development. Within the prototype development we will utilize our earlier discoveries to bio-engineer the antibiotics sensor. Within the business development arm we will perform a thorough market research to identify the market needs, map the competition and pinpoint market segments where our biosensor product would have an advantage over the competition. Our aim is to achieve an IP protected proof of concept prototype that will attract further external investments, leading to spawning of a start up company that will bring our technology to the market.

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: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.

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Programme(s)

Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.

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.

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.

ERC-POC - Proof of Concept Grant

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Call for proposal

Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.

(opens in new window) ERC-2015-PoC

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Host institution

WEIZMANN INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE
Net EU contribution

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.

€ 150 000,00
Address
HERZL STREET 234
7610001 Rehovot
Israel

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Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
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Total cost

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.

€ 150 000,00

Beneficiaries (1)

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