EuroMicropH COST Action to better understand details of how micro-organisms detect and respond to low pH.
Micro-organisms such as bacteria, yeasts, and other fungi are of great importance for the things they do for us, and the things they do to us. We need yeast for bread, beer, or wine; without bacteria most cheeses and yogurts could not be made.
In the future, petrochemicals may be replaced by compounds made from engineered micro-organisms, and new methods for manufacturing high volume and high value chemicals using them will be developed.
The challenge
The challenge of feeding a growing population as well as keeping food fresh and safe to eat by preventing microbial growth continues to require innovation on behalf of food scientists. This is particularly relevant as consumer demand for fewer artificial preservatives increases.
Progress in all these fields need a better understanding of the impact of low pH, (potential of hydrogen used to specify the acidity) on micro-organisms.
The drive towards natural food preservatives requires better understanding of the effects of organic acids like acetic, benzoic, citric, lactic, and sorbic acid which inhibit growth of spoilage organisms. The ability of these acids as an alternative to antibacterial and antifungals is receiving clinical attention, in the use of organic acids to treat infected wounds, and medicinal honey, a low pH wound dressing.
However, there are major bottlenecks in transferring these methods into applied fields, where the strains and growth conditions used are often different from model organisms in pure research. The applied fields do not exchange methods: clinicians using organic acids to treat infections do not communicate with food microbiologists, and neither talk to industrial microbiologists who may be using microbes to make products at low pH.
Yet their interests are two sides of the same coin, either preventing bacterial growth, or assisting it, at low pH, both of which need a deeper understanding of mechanisms.
So in steps COST Action Understanding and exploiting the impacts of low pH on micro-organisms (EuroMicropH) that will link pure research with sectors that can exploit this knowledge.
EuroMicropH: bridging knowledge
This topic is already being studied in considerable depth. There are many important practical applications in a number of diverse sectors, however, these sectors traditionally do not communicate well with each other.
These include the microbiology of food and drink, many aspects of industrial biotechnology and bio-processing, and clinical and veterinary treatment of infections in a time of increasing antimicrobial resistance.
The synergies will be far-reaching and will have a positive impact on both applied and fundamental research. The COST Action will enable movement of people and expertise between different fields studying and applying microbial responses to low pH:
“Beating down the barriers that exist between researchers and other professionals who deal with this same topic (low pH), but in different fields or sectors such as medicine, food production and safety, sustainable production processes, is the overarching aim of our Action”.
Daniela De Biase, Chair of EuroMicropH
The EuroMicropH COST Action, gathers experts in biological sciences, food production and safety, industrial biotechnology, and clinical medicine from 40 countries (33 of which are represented in the Management Committee, responsible for the coordination, implementation and management of an Action). The network helps, through the effective cross-disciplinary and cross-sectoral collaboration, to address the most pressing questions in the field and lead to new applications across a range of sectors.
Microbial responses
Developed by one of their working group, the network released recently a user-friendly database. It gathers more than 500 entries, which range from results of observations to molecular description of processes triggered by the exposure of microorganisms to low pH. Another resource developed by the Action is an interactive interface that presents data like methods and technologies used in research or industry. The data are relevant to the members of the network. This will allow the searching for needed expertise and/or potential collaborations in the field of microbial response to low pH and its exploitation for industrial processes.
Through a combination of Working Groups, workshops, Short-Term Scientific Missions, webinars and other dissemination activities, the Action aims to share consolidated as well as newly acquired knowledge, to better understand the details of how micro-organisms detect and respond to low pH.
They will ensure that technical developments being made in one field are rapidly translated into other fields. Leverage the many different areas of expertise that exist across Action members and ensure that these developments reach as wide an audience as possible.
Further reading
Discover the Action Newsletter
Additional information
View the Action webpage
View the network website
Cover photo by Marco Verch Professionals (Creative Commons 2.0)