Microbiome Implications and Foodborne Pathogens in Urban Environments

Urbanization is reshaping the microbial ecology of food systems by intensifying interactions among food, humans, animals, water, waste, infrastructure, and the built environment. Population density, expanding food production and distribution networks, informal markets, climate-related pressures, and limitations in sanitation and waste management may influence the persistence, transmission, and adaptation of foodborne microorganisms in urban settings.Urban-associated microbiomes may either promote or restrict pathogen survival, colonization, adaptation, virulence, and dissemination, while also influencing the selection and dissemination of antimicrobial resistance determinants. Foodborne pathogens may circulate across interconnected environments associated with food production, processing, retail, household preparation, wastewater, soil, animals, surfaces, and food-contact materials. However, the relationships among microbiome composition, environmental conditions, pathogen behavior, and public-health risk remain insufficiently understood.Anthropogenic food and water resources, including food waste, refuse sites, compost, market residues, livestock feed, urban gardens, and sewage-affected water, may also shape animal-associated microbiomes and resistomes. These resources may be accessed by wildlife, synanthropic species, domestic animals, pests, and peri-urban livestock. Such exposure may influence pathogen carriage and shedding and contribute to microbial exchange among animal populations, food systems, and the wider urban environment.This Research Topic aims to advance understanding of how urban-associated microbiomes influence the occurrence, persistence, transmission, adaptation, and detectability of foodborne pathogens. By integrating food microbiology with environmental monitoring, genomics, microbial ecology, epidemiology, and risk assessment, it seeks to strengthen surveillance, source attribution, and evidence-based strategies for improving food safety within a One Health framework.This Research Topic welcomes articles addressing:• Microbiomes of urban food production, processing, distribution, retail, catering, street food, and household environments• Occurrence, persistence, transmission, adaptation, and virulence of foodborne pathogens in urban food systems• Interactions between food-associated microbial communities and foodborne pathogens• Urban environmental reservoirs and microbial exchange involving water, wastewater, soil, waste, surfaces, food-contact materials, animals, and pests• Effects of anthropogenic food and water resources on animal-associated microbiomes, resistomes, pathogen carriage, and microbial shedding• Genomic, metagenomic, molecular, source-tracking, predictive, and risk-assessment approaches for pathogen detection and surveillance• Antimicrobial resistance and mobile genetic elements in urban food-associated microbiomes• Effects of climate, seasonality, sanitation, food handling, infrastructure, and supply-chain conditions on microbial hazards• Implications for food-safety surveillance, risk management, and One Health Topic editors: Antonia Mataragka, Nikolaos D. Andritsos Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/84708/microbiome-implications-and-foodborne-pathogens-in-urban-environments