Meet the 2025 Translational Microbiology Prize Winner, Professor David Aanensen

28 March 2025

Each year, the Microbiology Society awards the Translational Microbiology Prize Lecture (formerly the Unilever Colworth Prize Lecture) to an individual who has made a significant contribution to translational microbiology.

Ahead of the Translational Microbiology Prize Lecture, Julia Sanchez-Garrido interviewed Professor David Aanensen to learn more about his career and how it feels to win a Microbiology Society prize.

By Julia Sanchez-Garrido

Describing Professor David Aanensen’s work is a bit like trying to explain Instagram to your grandparents, but he has managed to distil his mission into something anyone can understand: his team combines knowledge of biology, computer science and public health to track and stop harmful germs.

The trickiest part of his job, he says, is making complex genomic data simple enough for people who aren’t knee-deep in DNA every day. “We spend a lot of time developing easy-to-use web and mobile systems,” Aanensen explains. These tools are designed to translate all those strings of genetic code into bite-sized insights into pathogen dynamics and evolution for everyone to understand, from lab researchers to national health officials. The end goal is to assist in decision-making to improve both patient and public health

From data to disease control: the perfect example of an achievement to be proud of

But what does implementing these tools actually look like in practice? As part of a large NIHR grant, Prof Aanensen’s team has been working with partners in Nigeria, India, Colombia and the Philippines for the past seven years to support embedding genomics and data interpretation into standard public health routine. In the Philippines, for example, this takes advantage of their 35-year AMR surveillance programme, which consists of about 25 sentinel hospitals who routinely collect information about sensitivity to antimicrobials.

The result is a government-driven system that can spot potential outbreaks before they turn into full-blown crises, such as neonatal sepsis outbreaks by the WHO defined critical pathogen Klebsiella pneumoniae. The system works by rapidly scanning hospital phenotypic data for unusual antimicrobial resistance patterns; if something looks off, they bring in genome sequencing to figure out if it’s actually an outbreak or just a random cluster of infections and use this information to implement infection control measures in the clinic. The best part? It's now completely owned and run in a public health routine basis within the government, and can be used as a model by other nations to leapfrog some of the slower steps in setting up their own AMR programs.

In fact, Nigerian researchers lead by Prof. Iruka Okeke (co-PI on the NIHR project), are looking to the Philippines as an example when setting up their own AMR national action plans. Once an AMR surveillance system is built in locations where most hospitals lack basic microbiology expertise, this will in turn allow further experience and information-sharing. According to Prof. Aanensen, that kind of knowledge-sharing is not just practical, it’s essential: “it turns an engine on that should allow continued growth but also acts as an exemplar for other locations.”

A bit of introspection and advice for us ECRs

Looking back, Prof. Aanensen highlights the importance of finding the right mentors and how his experience in research was enriched the moment he started working with and utilising the advice from talented scientists from different fields: computer science, evolutionary biology and public health. He just wishes he could “…have had the advice to do that earlier.” He also reminds us that while it is key to test your own ideas with multiple individuals to get different viewpoints, sometimes one has to trust their own gut! With the benefit of hindsight, I think we can all think of a moment during which we regret not listening to ourselves as much as we maybe should have; after all, confidence grows in different areas and at different times.

Being part of a great team makes the day at work so much better

When asked about the best part of his job, Prof Aanensen has no doubts: it’s seeing the work from his talented team come to life and make an impact. Whether it’s when the biologists discuss new insight that allows you to see the biology behind the data that's on the screen, or when the engineering team make a new function that goes into one of our tools and you can see how it's going to be beneficial for anybody that uses it, he gets that feeling of excitement that keeps you going. As his research progressed and expanded Prof. Aanensen has seen his team grow and, in his own words, “as a team grows, your responsibility grows beyond yourself and it's around supporting a broader family, a broader team”. While this was initially a challenge, it is worth it. “Our scientists know an unhealthy amount of JavaScript,” he laughs. “And our engineers know way too much microbiology.” This blend of expertise is what makes it possible for his team to build tools that both scientists and policymakers can use without a PhD in either genomics or computer science.

While Prof. Aanensen admits that administrative tasks and meetings aren’t exactly his idea of fun, he knows that he is very lucky in that, as part of a pretty big team, they “have some very talented administrators and project managers who really are the heart of how and why we can do what we do.” I completely agree with him, in that the operations teams are often unappreciated and their value “is not called out as much as it should be.”

When and how did inspiration strike about AMR and pathogen surveillance?

Prof. Aanensen always had a strong drive towards delivery of microbiological and evolutionary insight via the web and, when it comes down to it, genomics allows us to identify pathogenic risk and nowadays a big risk factor globally is antimicrobial resistance (AMR); but how did it all start? Early in his career, Prof. Aanensen was fortunate to get involved with the European Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance system (EARS). He worked with countries across Europe, who were publishing yearly updates on drug-resistant bacteria, using maps to show trends. This brought together heads of national AMR labs every six months to discuss their work, policies, and progress, compiling this information into actionable insights. At one of these meetings, it was clear how molecular epidemiology could add value to the data being shared. While the data typically identified a bug and a drug, molecular information could provide more detail. For example, if MRSA was increasing in a country, they could track if it was a specific strain and whether it originated locally or elsewhere. ‘We all saw the importance of this approach’.

Around that time, the internet was growing, and whole genome sequencing was emerging. The combination of these two advancements made him realise the potential for this work on a “more continental and then global scale”. This solidified his excitement for this field, knowing it had far-reaching implications for both continental and global health.

Bringing pathogen surveillance to the next level: the plumbing problem and the future

While Prof. Aanensen is excited about the future of genomic surveillance, he’s also frustrated by what he calls “the plumbing” problem. No, not actual pipes, but the basic infrastructure needed to collect, share, and interpret all that genomic data. The goal, he says, is to now continue to expand this infrastructure to low middle income settings to really “translate into ownership of both the technology but also the ability to interpret in locations that aren't as resource rich as ours”. Examples such as the scenario in the Philippines provide direct evidence that their approaches are actually making a difference in infection control on the patient level and the population level. ‘The satisfaction of working with equal partners across the globe towards a shared collective aim of impactful pathogen surveillance and intervention, is constantly inspiring’.

Looking forward, Prof. Aanensen’s vision is nothing short of global. As a World Health Organization collaborating centre contributing to  the GLASS[SGJ3]  project, his team is working to democratise the infrastructural systems  that could detect emerging threats in real time. Think of it as a supercharged version of those pandemic dashboards we all obsessively checked during COVID-19 but for everything from MRSA to new strains of emerging pathogens. This monitoring would allow for longitudinal studies to see how the population changes and would open the door to understanding the efficacy of interventions such as vaccines or other therapeutics.

The pandemic in a way was game changing, as “genomics was really used as a frontline public health tool”. It became a time where one could talk to their non-scientist mum about “what a variant is and that a variant is part is part of something that's different to other things, and it can be worse.” Moreover, it highlighted the need to push the translation of these tools and applications  in AMR and while the logistics might seem daunting, Prof. Aanensen is surprisingly optimistic. “The technology is well-proven,” he says. Now, it’s just a matter of getting the plumbing in place so that every country can turn genomic data into real-time responses.

The importance of the Microbiology Society and community nurturing

Upon being asked about the Microbiology Society, Prof. Aanensen goes back to the very first poster that he ever made, which he presented at the annual Microbiology Society (then called the Society for General Microbiology or SGM) meeting in Glasgow. That experience was “like an introduction to the conference world within microbiology”, which opens your eyes to the fact that you are actually surrounded by individuals who share similar thought processes and passions. This realisation leads to a feeling of becoming part of a community, which can be both very empowering and a bit overwhelming because you get to see the vast amount of research that's done in all areas within microbiology but also get to feel like you belong. From how he speaks about it despite the years gone by, one can tell that this first conference meant “an awful lot” to Prof. Aanensen. He emphasises that the Microbiology Society not only excels in creating an inclusive and supportive environment, but also is particularly effective in identifying future trends to then empower initiatives going forward, and he looks forward to continuing to follow the growth of the microbiology community both in the UK and globally.

In the end, Prof. Aanensen’s enthusiasm is contagious (pun absolutely intended). By making genomics accessible, understandable, and above all, useful, he’s turning what was once a niche corner of microbiology into a cornerstone of public health. And if we’re lucky, that might just change the way we fight diseases around the world.