Figure 1.

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) of ARBs and ARGs (Von Wintersdorff et al., 2016). Conjugation is the direct transfer of DNA molecule known as a plasmid from a donor bacterium to a recipient bacterium, involving cell-to-cell contact between the two bacteria. Transduction is the transfer of DNA from a donor bacterium to a recipient bacterium, through viruses that infect bacteria, known as bacteriophages. Transformation is intra- and inter-species exchange of genetic information by uptake of naked DNA, released through cell lysis or actively excreted by some bacteria which can only be received by a competent bacterium. Following uptake and translocation to the cytoplasm, it is incorporated into the competent bacterium’s chromosome or into a plasmid (Koutsoumanis et al., 2021; Uluseker et al., 2021; Courti et al., 2022).