Interview to Marta Lores (USC) in ASAJA Magazine
Project overview
May 24, 2023
TO PREVENT IS TO PROTECT
June 12, 2023
“The formulations developed at NeoGiANT will provide antimicrobial and antioxidant protection to animals, improving their well-being and acting as preventive therapies. Besides, the project is contributing to transform a wine waste, like grape marc, into a source of bioactive substances with antimicrobial and antioxidant potential”.
Regarding the improper and excessive use of antibiotics, do you consider that it is accelerating resistance to antimicrobials? If so, why?
- I would like to start by saying that antibiotics are amazing medicines, useful and necessary; many lives, both human and animal, have been saved thanks to them. It is definitely not our intention to contribute to give them a “bad name”.
- The problem is, indeed, the misuse and abuse of antibiotics. Their function is really well defined: different antibiotics act against specific bacteria that cause diseases and “neutralise” them, inhibiting their growth or causing their death. But not all antibiotics are suitable to attack all bacteria; they don’t serve as preventive therapy; they are not suitable against viruses, parasites or fungi.
What is antimicrobial resistance? How can it affect people and animals?
- Antimicrobial resistance (AMR), appears when bacteria (and other microorganisms) change through time and stop responding to medicines. This makes it more difficult to treat infections and it increases the risk of propagation of these diseases, or of more serious varieties of existing diseases and also the risk of death. AMR is a phenomenon which appears naturally over time, generally through genetic modifications.
- As a consequence of this resistance, antibiotics and other antimicrobial medicines become inefficient, and infections are becoming more difficult to treat and even incurable. It is especially alarming how quickly these multi resistant and pan-resistant bacteria (also called «super bacteria») are spreading worldwide, provoking infections which can’t be treated with usual antimicrobial medicines, like classical antibiotics. This is because they have acquired new resistance mechanisms. Antimicrobial-resistant organisms are present in people, animals and the environment (water, soil, air). They can spread from person to person or between people and animals; particularly, from food made out of animal-derived products. This is a message from the World Health Organisation that we must disseminate.
Do you consider it is necessary to raise more awareness on the negative effects of this misuse?
- Awareness is key, it is essential; especially through the dissemination of suitable and truthful information in a way that is understandable by everybody. We, people, are an active part for the contribution of the appearance of antimicrobial resistances, as they are derived not only of the misuse and bad use of antimicrobials; but also, the lack of access to clean water, sanitation and hygiene for people and animals; deficient measures of prevention and control of infections and, even, non-compliance of the legislation.
In this sense, which is the role of NeoGiANT against this threat?
- NeoGiANT is a European project which aims at developing efficient complementary or alternative formulations to the main antibiotics used in farmed animals and aquaculture, contributing to the objective of reducing their use. This way, they will only be used for the treatment of serious infections and not as a preventive and indiscriminate measure. NeoGiANT products are based on the action of polyphenols of vegetal origin as an alternative method to control bacterial infections.
Which is the key goal of the project?
- The main goal is developing and validating innovative natural formulations based on white grape polyphenols (which are natural defences produced by plants, with antimicrobial and anti-oxidant properties, among others) for its use in bovine, swine, poultry and fish, considering all the animal production process (feed, health and reproduction). The objective is reducing the use of classical antibiotics, which, at the same time, implies a reduction on the development of AMR in these animals.
How is NeoGiANT going to contribute to the prevention of antimicrobial resistance?
- NeoGiANT follows the idea of “better the prevention than the cure”. The activities of these vegetal extracts will be exploited in a synergic way: as an Anti-oxidant, designing alternative additives for animal feed; and as an Antimicrobial, proposing formulations as alternative or complementary therapies for the animal production sector (mastitis in cows, exudative epidermitis in swine and for enteric diseases in poultry and aquaculture). Both activities are not mutually exclusive: the better the anti-oxidant state of these animals (fed with chow formulated with our extracts), the better their general health state will be, and the better their resistance if they are attacked by undesired microbials.
- Also, the substitution of conventional preservatives with NeoGiANT bioactive extracts in the sperm diluents, will reduce dependency from antibiotics, as well, within artificial reproduction in farmed animals. This strategy will contribute to prevent diseases, diminishing the need to use conventional antibiotics and, therefore, the possibilities to develop antimicrobial resistance.
How can the project help the agri-food sector? And the farming sector?
- Within the agri-food sector, it will contribute by turning a wine sector waste, the white grape marc, into a source of bioactive substances with an enormous antimicrobial and antioxidant potential. In the EU more than 11 million tonnes of grape for wine production are grown. Around 25% by weight, in dry state, of this feedstock turns into a by-product, the grape marc, which we use as raw material for our extracts, valorising this waste y and bringing an alternative use of this by-product to wineries.
- And within the farming sector, the formulations developed within NeoGiANT will provide antimicrobial and antioxidant protection to animals, improving their welfare and performance, as well as acting as preventive therapies. The products developed during the project will be designed to control a great number of important infectious diseases within the animal production sector, both in farming (bovine, swine and poultry) and aquaculture; but they will not only serve to avoid the growth of pathogens, but to improve animal health and welfare, raising the profitability of farming and aquaculture installations.
Conversely, how can these sectors contribute to the project?
- One way to collaborate in a direct way is visiting our webpage (https://www.neogiant.eu/ ) and complete a survey designed especially for farmers and workers within the agri-food sector. Your answers may help us getting to know the needs of these sectors better. Also, subscribing to our newsletter to know how the project is advancing and keeping up until the day that the final products will be ready.
What phase of development is the project at?
- We just reached our first year as an ongoing project and we still have other three years to go, but the provisional results are really promising. For now, we focused on optimising the polyphenol extraction and on studying in vitro (in bacterial cultures at the laboratory) the antimicrobial properties of the obtained extracts, as well as on elaborating the first therapeutic prototypes and on obtaining the right additives for the feed. The year 2023 will be crucial for the development of NeoGiANT because we will start with the in vivo tests, with real animals; now, of course this work will be carried out respecting the essential bioethical considerations for this kind of experiments at all times.
Why did you choose Albariño and not another grape variety? What are the properties that make it ideal?
- The seed of this project emerged from one of our investigations (I mean, the LIDSA investigation group at Universidade de Santiago de Compostela), which studied polyphenols from Galician white wines. During this study, we collaborated with over 20 wineries from the 5 Galician designations of origin which produced white wines with several varieties, highlighting Albariño as one of the majoritarian ones. We have studies which confirm that any white grape variety may be used for the obtention of these extracts, not only Galicians, of course. But the geographical proximity and the great collaboration built with many of these wineries makes it easier for us to obtain the Albariño grape marc, and it continues this way. Because it is important to highlight that we profit this waste from the wine industry: we use the white grape marc right after the grape must has been obtained, which will turn into a high-quality white wine and, this way, enables a really powerful alternative for an agri-food by-product, aligned with circular economy.
- White grapes, like Albariño, are different from red grapes fundamentally because these don’t have anthocyanins (the polyphenols that provide the red colour to red wines as well as to many red berries and flowers). Red grapes have been much more studied than white ones, but these have specific polyphenols, which turn their extracts into powerful antimicrobials and antioxidant; this really made a difference.
Marta Lores
Degree on Biology and a PhD on Chemistry by the University of Santiago de Compostela; Professor of Analytical Chemistry at the Analytical Chemistry, Nutrition and Bromatology of this same university; Investigation Group GI-2085-USC (LIDSA: Laboratory of Research and Development of Analytical Solutions). I have been a researcher and a professor at the university form over 25 years.
My career can be summed up with the development and application of extraction techniques and the preparation of samples based on Green Chemistry and the use of techniques for the chromatographic assessment and mass spectrometry. This approach applies through three main sectors: wine and its by-products assessment and their recovery and valorisation; the analysis of natural products and bioactive compounds of natural origin in diverse extracts and matrices; and the analytical control of cosmetic ingredients. The main families of compounds are polyphenols, terpenoids, fatty acids in natural products; and compounds in fragrances (allergens and musk), conservatives and phthalates in cosmetics. I have produced over 130 publications and presented over 150 lectures at national and international congresses, some of them awarded (h index: 34, Scopus), 41 (Google Scholar). I own two patents one of them with European extension and exploitation. I am a partner and strategic Scientific Director of a technology-based company: i-Grape Laboratory (an USC spin-off).
I am the coordinator of the H2020 NeogiANT project, with 20 partners from 8 European countries, > 8M€; main researcher or researcher at 33 research competitive projects at regional and national scale and in over 40 R&D contracts with relevant companies and non-profit organisations.
University of Santiago de Compostela
USC is a public university dedicated to the preservation, generation, transmission and dissemination of knowledge in a socially responsible way and connected to the demands and challenges of the Galician society. Universidade de Santiago de Compostela counts on a wide academic offer and a powerful research capacity and has been valued for its excellence as one of the best Spanish universities of the European Superior Education Space. USC is a pioneer institution in the area of entrepreneurship politics development, boost of R&D as well as the transfer and valorisation of research results.
Over 500 years of history have built a unique identity of USC around freedom, equality, justice, pluralism, sustainability and ethical commitment ad inspiring values for university life.
You can read the original interview published by ASAJA in Spanish here.
