Antimicrobial Resistance in Freshwater: Indicators, Influences, and Ecosystem Dynamics

Freshwater ecosystems receive antimicrobial-resistant bacteria, resistance genes, and pharmaceutical residues from wastewater, agriculture, aquaculture, and other human activities. These systems are not only recipients of contamination: their diverse microbial communities can retain, exchange, and transform resistance determinants, while pollutants such as antibiotics may affect both microbial selection and aquatic organisms. Resistance also occurs naturally, so environmental monitoring must distinguish background diversity from changes linked to human pressures. Recent work connects environmental resistomes with land use and contaminant inputs, while advances in sequencing, targeted gene detection, and resistance testing make broader assessment possible. Freshwater mussels and other organisms may also help reveal exposure and biological effects. Understanding these processes matters for freshwater biodiversity, water quality, and public health, and supports the conservation goals of Frontiers in Freshwater Science.This Research Topic will examine how antimicrobial resistance (AMR) occurs, changes, and affects freshwater ecosystems, and how freshwater observations can inform practical monitoring and mitigation. A central challenge is to connect resistance genes and resistant bacteria with their ecological context: contaminant mixtures, microbial community shifts, aquatic species health, and human activities across catchments. We welcome studies that combine environmental microbiology and ecotoxicology with robust resistance assessment, including culture-based susceptibility testing, targeted molecular assays, metagenomics, and analysis of mobile genetic elements. Comparative and longitudinal monitoring can help distinguish natural resistomes from anthropogenic signals and reveal where surveillance methods need to be harmonized. We also seek evidence on whether wastewater and other pollution controls, or microbial and nature-based remediation, reduce contaminant exposure and AMR-related risks without creating new ecological harms. By bringing environmental and One Health perspectives together, the Topic aims to strengthen evidence for freshwater management, conservation, and clean-water policy.We invite contributions on antimicrobial-resistant bacteria and resistance genes in freshwater rivers, lakes, wetlands, groundwater, sediments, and biofilms; their sources, transport, persistence, and exchange; and the role of antibiotics and other co-selective pollutants. Relevant themes include microbial diversity and resistome structure; phenotypic and genomic methods for detecting resistance; mobile genetic elements; links between catchment pressures and freshwater AMR; effects on microbial communities, mussels and other bioindicators, aquatic species, and ecosystem processes; and surveillance frameworks that support comparison across sites or connect environmental, veterinary, and clinical data. Studies of pollutant removal or bioremediation are welcome when they assess freshwater outcomes and AMR-related effects. We seek Original Research, Methods, Reviews, Mini Reviews, Systematic Reviews, and Perspectives. Submissions focused only on clinical treatment, terrestrial systems, or contaminant toxicity without a clear freshwater-AMR link are outside the Topic’s scope. Topic editors: Maria Luisa Castrejon Godinez, Alexis Rodríguez, Asta Dambrauskiene Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/86710/antimicrobial-resistance-in-freshwater-indicators-influences-and-ecosystem-dynamics