"Many people think that antibiotic resistance is only a problem in clinical settings such as hospitals. However, it is also an issue in agriculture as antibiotic use in animals such as pigs contributes to resistant organisms in the environment.
"Pigs are often given antibiotic therapy and this can lead to the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria in the animal gut. These bacteria can pass to you if you eat pork which isn’t cooked or handled properly. This may mean that any future antibiotics you are given might not be as effective.
"There is a lot of public awareness about combatting antibiotic resistance in hospitals. However, more research needs to be conducted into combatting antibiotic resistance in other environments and promoting this outside of scientific communities. I hope my work will benefit many different parties including farmers, feed suppliers and the consumer.
"What I particularly like about being on the ESF-funded KESS 2 programme is that I am linked with an industrial partner, Feed, Food and Future Ltd. This means I can spend time at their head office and gain skills outside of an academic environment. I’ve also had the opportunity to attend events with my industrial partner which have related to important themes within my PhD topic.
"Doing my PhD at USW is great. I have really supportive academic supervisors and lab members whose input and guidance has been invaluable. I spend most of time at the Glyntaff campus; the views from the lab aren’t bad either!
"Being a science research student is full of successes and setbacks. Sometimes things work the way you expect and sometimes they don’t but what I have learnt is that a negative result is still a result. It is a great feeling when you complete an experiment and get some good data, though!"
