Ana Hurtado Esgueva

TRAYECTORIA

Ana Hurtado gained her PhD in Molecular Microbiology from the University of London (Queen Mary & Westfield College) in 1997 working on the identification and typing of Helicobacter and Campylobacter species at the Central Public Health Laboratory Service, London. After a post-doc at the Universidad Miguel Hernández (Alicante, Spain) she joined the Department of Animal Health at NEIKER, where she became group leader in 2001. She is responsible for the Food Safety research area which focuses its activity on food-borne bacterial infections and antimicrobial resistance at the farm end of the food safety continuum. Her research interests include the investigation of the role of livestock production in the safety of food products of animal origin and the spread of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Studies developed so far have provided us with novel methods to improve diagnostic and characterisation of infectious pathogens of veterinary and zoonotic importance. We use bacteriological and molecular techniques for the detection, isolation and characterisation (including AMR profiles) of the main food-borne bacterial pathogens on livestock farms. We carry out epidemiological monitoring programmes at farms in the Basque Country to determine their prevalence, evaluate trends and measure the effect of the implemented control strategies. We use high-throughput sequencing techniques to characterise AMR mechanisms by whole-genome sequencing and to have a complete image of whole environments surrounding infection by metagenomics.