From Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine
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The Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Martin Heydon TD, today announced an award to Irish researchers at Teagasc and University College Cork, as part of the international US-Ireland Research and Development Partnership.
Researchers in Ireland are teaming up with Queen’s University Belfast and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA to investigate the use of viruses (phages) that infect bacteria as an alternative to treatment with conventional antibiotics in the treatment of Streptococcus sui, a bacterial pathogen associated with respiratory and intestinal infection in pigs that constitutes a significant animal health and welfare issue for the pig sector.
The project, with a budget of almost €1 million, has been awarded over €340,000 by the Department for research to be conducted in Ireland.
Announcing the award today the Minister said
“I am delighted to announce new funding for Irish-based researchers in the development of new therapies that aim to tackle antimicrobial resistance and specific infections associated with animal health and welfare in the pig sector. This project allows Irish researchers to partner and collaborate with their Northern Irish and American counterparts and further strengthens international capacity and capability in the Irish research sector.”
The Minister also announced the launch of the tripartite 2022 Agriculture Call under the US-Ireland Research and Development Partnership with our partners from the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) in Northern Ireland and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). The 2022 Agriculture Call reinforces the importance of international scientific collaboration on critical research topics, while also extending new opportunities for the co-funding of joint research proposals in six additional research areas important for the Department. These include:
• Sustainable Bioeconomy through Biobased Products
• Sustainable Agroecosystems: Health, Functions, Processes and Management
• Bioprocessing and Bioengineering
• Agricultural Microbiomes in Plant Systems and Natural Resources
• Data Science for Food and Agriculture Systems (DSFAS)
• Inter-Disciplinary Engagement in Animal Systems (IDEAS)
Stressing the importance of strategically aligned international funding opportunities to help address national challenges and maximise research and innovation in the Irish agri-food-forest and bio-based sectors, Minister Heydon said “It is a unique opportunity for Irish researchers to be a part of this important and evolving international agriculture research call under the US-Ireland Research and Development Partnership. In this week of Science, the addition of new research areas gives rise to wider opportunities for scientists in Ireland to collaborate on important research topics with our American and Northern Irish partners and to share ideas, expertise, and resources to both tackle our national research priorities and to contribute to issues which affect the agri-food-forest and bio-based systems on a global level.”
More information about the funding programme is available at the following link to the Department website: US-Ireland Research and Development Partnership Call in Agriculture
Notes for editor
• The call invites eligible Research Performing Organisations (RPOs) from the Republic of Ireland to submit joint research proposals, with collaborating partners from the USA and Northern Ireland, under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) of the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA). The submission deadline to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine and the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) in Northern Ireland is four weeks in advance of the stated NIFA deadline for the respective Programme Area Priority in AFRI’s 2022 Foundation Competitive Grant Programme. This earlier launch of the 2022 Agriculture Call allows time for RPOs in Ireland to network and find partners across the other jurisdictions, and to explore and develop their ideas in the research areas on offer under the Call in advance of the submission deadline in 2022.
• The US-Ireland R&D Partnership is a product of the Northern Ireland Peace Process and involves the governments of the United States of America, Ireland and Northern Ireland working together for scientific progress by awarding grants for research on a competitive basis.
• The Partnership was launched in 2006 and to date a total combined funding of €105.697 million ($125.552 million) has been awarded to 65 projects in 7 priority areas under the Partnership that include: Cybersecurity; Agriculture; Health; Nanoscale Science & Engineering; Sensors & Sensor Networks; Telecommunications; Energy & Sustainability.
• The Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) is the leading competitive grants program for agricultural sciences in the US. Since 2016 the scope of the Partnership has been extended to include agriculture on a pilot basis whereby researchers in eligible institutions in Ireland and Northern Ireland can link with a US-based researcher to submit research funding applications to annual Calls launched by the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA).
• The Department’s funding of successful projects under the US-Ireland R&D Partnership Calls comes from the Department’s competitive research funding programme.
• The research areas or PAPs eligible for application under the 2022 Agriculture Call have been increased from six to twelve PAPs (new PAPs are in bold). The twelve PAPs available for application proposals are:
• Pests and Beneficial Species in Agricultural Production Systems
• Animal Nutrition, Growth, and Lactation
• Welfare and Well-being of Agricultural Animals
• Diseases of Agricultural Animals
• Animal Breeding and Functional Annotation of Genomes
• Mitigating Antimicrobial Resistance Across the Food Chain
• Sustainable Bioeconomy through Biobased Products
• Sustainable Agroecosystems: Health, Functions, Processes and Management
• Bioprocessing and Bioengineering
• Agricultural Microbiomes in Plant Systems and Natural Resources
• Data Science for Food and Agriculture Systems (DSFAS)
• Inter-Disciplinary Engagement in Animal Systems (IDEAS)
• Funding of the successful project PhageSUAS under the 2020 Agriculture Call of the US-Ireland Research and Development comprised of awards of €342,190.20 from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine; $500,000.00 from USDA and £168,738.00 from DAERA (a total project award by all three funding partners of €962,356.11 at current exchange rates).
• PhageSUAS - Improved Pig Health through the Novel Application of SynBio in Phage Therapy; Teagasc, Awarded €238,250.00 (Dr. John Kenny, Project co-ordinator); University College Cork, €103,940.20 (Dr. Jennifer Mahony); Collaborating institutions: Queen’s University Belfast, University of Wisconsin-Madison.
o Abstract: Streptococcus suis (S. suis) is a pig pathobiont that is almost ubiquitously carried in the nasopharynx. S. suis infection is most commonly associated with a previous intestinal or respiratory infection, leading to S. suis-mediated meningitis, polyarthritis, septicaemia, pneumonia and endocarditis. As a consequence, S. suis infections are a significant international animal welfare and economic burden in the pig industry. This project is expected to yield innovative and effective phage therapy solutions to specifically target S. suis in pigs. The project will use a rational design approach to generate and test phage cocktails. This design will allow the phages in the cocktail to kill a wide range of infectious S. suis strains while circumventing bacterial-mediated phage resistance, a key roadblock to the use of phage therapy (PT). Simultaneously, we will develop the Generally Regarded As Safe (GRAS) gut symbiont Lactobacillus reuteri as next-generation probiotics to deliver antimicrobials to eradicate S. suis from the pig gastrointestinal tract.