The mission of Pandemic ESCAPE is to advance our understanding of pandemic emergence and resilience within the nexus of human behavior, wildlife, and the environment.
Researcher James Keck pipettes wastewater into a PCR tube for analysis.
A wastewater technician preparing a wastewater sample for PCR testing after training with University of Kentucky lab technicians.
Pandemic ESCAPE came into existence as a result of funding from the National Science Foundation with its Predictive Intelligence for Pandemic Prevention (PIPP) grant. The aim of the PIPP grant is to transform society's ability to forecast the likelihood of pandemic-scale events, detect outbreaks early, and respond efficiently and Pandemic ESCAPE plans to respond to that challenge in a number of different ways:
The Environmental Surveillance for Everyone (ESE) research area will develop, benchmark, and implement technologies and assays that increase access to environmental surveillance, particularly in regions that are currently underserved. The ESE team combines expertise in engineering, assay development, and public health impact. The ultimate goal of the ESE research area is to develop a cost-effective diagnostic point-of-care device that can process environmental samples and detect pathogens of interest. The team will do this by employing iterative processes that seek to simplify sample processing techniques to enable automation. ESE will work with investigators in other research areas of the center to ensure that these assays and processes are developed in a way that makes them easily accessible to citizen scientists and public health professionals alike.
The ESE team has been developing some of these technologies for years using funds from other grants. Some of these early prototypes have been deployed and validated under extremely challenging field conditions. A simplified wastewater sampling process developed by our team was taught to researchers and technicians at Uganda’s Joint Clinical Research Centre (JCRC). JCRC researchers were then able to process samples collected in Uganda to look for certain pathogens of concern. Wastewater from Uganda was also processed by both JCRC and our team to look for drug resistant bacteria in the country.
The Data to Decisions (D2D) group will support the translation of genomic data from environmental samples into information and knowledge for pandemic response and surveillance to support ESE in both low- and high-resource settings. Our team will do this using a three-pronged approach involving 1) microbial genomic and bioinformatics, 2) modeling to support clinical and public health decisions regarding pandemic preparedness and One Health, and 3) visualization of information and results for clinical and public health decision-making.
The D2D team will work with community partners to create customized online and offline pipelines for metagenomic analysis and more generic pipelines that will be shared with online communities to further the science of metagenomic analysis. They will submit their sequenced genomes to online databases like NCBI SRA and GenBank to ensure that the scientific community writ large has access to them. They will also create Geographic Information Systems (GIS) models that can be used by communities and by public health practitioners to better understand the dynamics of the spread of disease in various environments and contexts.
The Community Science research team will use a co-productive approach and participatory methods to engage communities in ES and to translate Environmental Surveillance for Everyone (ESE) and Data to Decisions (D2D) across three socio-epidemiologic contexts: rural Alaska, Kentucky, and Indonesia. Our team will focus on human-environment relationships known to be possible sources of spillover and pathogen exposure (interactions with wild animals through hunting and/or wet markets, water insecurity/untreated water consumption and flooding). This participatory community science approach will enable the Center to integrate, test, and adapt the environmental assays created by the ESE team and the analytical tools developed by the D2D team.
The Community Science team will expand previous work in participatory disease surveillance to generate new sources of pandemic intelligence and actionable community data to support pandemic prevention, response, and mitigation. We envision engagement through a co-production process, partnering with the communities throughout all stages of the project. A truly co-productive process ensures that all relevant knowledge systems and knowledge holders are afforded equitable space, respect, responsibilities, and decision-making power throughout the life of a research project. By bringing Western science, community, and Indigenous perspectives together, we will attempt to create enhanced and novel understandings of environmental surveillance.
The research being conducted by the Environmental Surveillance Center for Assessing Pandemic Emergence is currently being funded by a generous grant from the National Science Foundation. We also have a number of collaborators across sectors that will help us to achieve our mission. These collaborators include:
We appreciate all that our partners do to aid us in our mission and would not be successful were it not for their efforts. It is likely that our list of partners will grow over time as our core team identifies additional synergies that will help us achieve our goals.
Early detection of pathogens that may pose a threat to human health in the environment can help to prevent the next global pandemic. Pandemic ESCAPE and its team of researchers is dedicated to developing the next generation of scientists to prepare them for the challenges of pandemic prevention and response. By creating the next generation of technologies for pathogen detection and the next generation of scientists eager to perform the work, we increase our odds of early detection and ensure an appropriate response. To that end, we will be developing curricula for all education levels including K-12, undergraduate, and graduate level.
Center researchers have been working towards this goal for years already with previous grant funding. Our lab technicians, who are themselves graduate and postdoctoral students, have created standard operating procedures that were used to train wastewater treatment plant operators how to perform PCR detection of pathogens in wastewater they’ve collected. They’ve also demonstrated these techniques to high school teachers so that the teachers could discuss them with their students. Lastly, instructional content was developed by our team that was taught in classrooms in Malawi for a Girls Science Day.
Center researcher Dr. Sahar Alameh and Center director Dr. Scott Berry talk to a grade school student and woman about environmental surveillance in front of the University of Kentucky’s Disease Detectives mobile lab van.
A group of high school students is given a tour of a local wastewater treatment facility in south-Central Kentucky.
A group of young female students in Malawi are taught about pathogens and environmental surveillance for Girls’ Science Day using a curriculum developed by Pandemic ESCAPE researchers.
Pandemics affect all of us, but individuals in poorer areas of the United States and the world generally have less access to care than those in wealthier urban areas. Recognition of this fact is what drives a lot of the research that we do at Pandemic ESCAPE. Viruses with pandemic potential could emerge anywhere, and areas where humans and animals interact are of particular concern as potential vectors of virus. The areas where these interactions take place tend to be more remote, which is why we want to enable detection of viruses closer to the source.
Throughout our efforts, we will work closely with disadvantaged communities and communities of color to ensure that their voices are heard, and their needs are met by our technologies and our training. We will also commit to ensuring that a diversity of voices are represented in our External Advisory Committee. Much of our development work will be done in Appalachia, in Indigenous communities, and in low- and middle- income countries (LMICs) to ensure that these vulnerable populations are given the tools they need to protect themselves, their communities, and their countries. Every step of the way, we will ensure that sensitive data is protected and will work closely with our partners to ensure that all of their concerns are addressed swiftly.
Pandemic ESCAPE is committed to ensuring that the solutions it develops are created in consultation with the communities they are designed to help. In doing this, we hope to drive adoption of these important technologies in the communities that need them most. We will work hand in hand with public health officials in these communities and perform surveys to gain the perspective of the average citizen regarding their consent to use of the technologies that we develop. Through the use of participatory science, we will encourage community members to take an active interest in protecting their health and the health of other members of the community. We hope to develop technologies that are simple enough to be used by citizen scientists who live in the communities where these technologies will be deployed.
Awareness is also something that the center prioritizes. While wastewater surveillance, and environmental surveillance more broadly, certainly picked up some supporters during the COVID-19 pandemic, federal and state funding for these programs is dissipating as we get further from the early days of the pandemic. To help facilitate a groundswell of support for the further funding of these programs, we view spreading awareness as crucial as will be engaging in a number of activities towards that end. Pandemic ESCAPE investigators have previously planned a series of field trips for younger children to a wastewater treatment plant in Kentucky to help them understand what takes place at these facilities. The team has also been working on developing a wastewater-based surveillance (WBE) exhibit for a local museum in Louisville, KY. Local efforts like these will help us educate young people about the importance of environmental surveillance and will hopefully get them excited about a future career in public health, epidemiology, virology, or microbiology.
Scott BerryCenter Director
Dr. Scott Berry is an Associate Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Kentucky. Dr. Berry has been developing molecular assays for the purpose of detecting disease for the last 13 years. He has led many collaborative studies involving engineers, scientists, biologists, clinicians, and public health experts spanning multiple countries as well as the interfaces between academia, industry, and government.
James KeckCommunity Science
Dr. James Keck will be heading Pandemic ESCAPE’s Community Science research area. He is an Adjunct Research Professor at the University of Alaska-Anchorage, Research Physician with the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, and guest researcher at the Arctic Investigations Program of the CDC. Dr. Keck is a physician scientist and epidemiologist with expertise in infectious disease surveillance, mixed methods research, and the health of remote, rural, and Tribal communities.
Matthew ScotchData Decisions
Dr. Matthew Scotch will head the Data to Decisions research area. Dr. Scotch is a Professor of Biomedical Informatics at Arizona State University and Assistant Director of the Biodesign Center for Environmental Health Engineering. Dr. Scotch is an expert in genomic epidemiology, bioinformatics, and public health. He focuses on pathogenic RNA viruses with a particular interest in influenza A viruses (human and avian).
Sarah OlsonDirector of Health Research for the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS)
Dr. Sarah Olson is the Director of Health Research for the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), one of Pandemic ESCAPE’s key non-profit partners. Dr. Olson is trained in environmental research and public health and her career has focused on frontline wildlife conservation and One Health challenges. She leads multi-site research focused on understanding and mitigating wildlife health and zoonotic disease threats, often associated with anthropogenic drivers, and helping grow sustainable and effective environmental surveillance systems with communities and protected areas.
Sahar AlamehEducation, Training, and Outreach
Dr. Sahar Alameh will be heading Education, Training, and Outreach activities for the center. Dr. Alameh is an Assistant Professor of STEM Education at the University of Kentucky with applied experience in K-12 and higher education digital and print curriculum and lesson design. Her research is largely focused on supporting students in developing informed views of the nature of science and the practices of scientists, particularly during challenging times like pandemics and environmental emergencies.
