The Strategies of Pathogen-Oriented Therapy on Circumventing Antimicrobial Resistance
Zifang Shang,
Siew Yin Chan,
Qing Song,
Peng Li,
Wei Huang
Affiliations
Zifang Shang
Frontiers Science Center for Flexible Electronics (FSCFE), Xi’an Institute of Flexible Electronics (IFE) & Xi’an Institute of Biomedical Materials and Engineering (IBME), Northwestern Polytechnical University (NPU), Xi’an 710072, China
Siew Yin Chan
Frontiers Science Center for Flexible Electronics (FSCFE), Xi’an Institute of Flexible Electronics (IFE) & Xi’an Institute of Biomedical Materials and Engineering (IBME), Northwestern Polytechnical University (NPU), Xi’an 710072, China
Qing Song
Frontiers Science Center for Flexible Electronics (FSCFE), Xi’an Institute of Flexible Electronics (IFE) & Xi’an Institute of Biomedical Materials and Engineering (IBME), Northwestern Polytechnical University (NPU), Xi’an 710072, China; Key Laboratory for Organic Electronics and Information Displays (KLOEID) and Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM), Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications (NUPT), Nanjing 210023, China
Peng Li
Frontiers Science Center for Flexible Electronics (FSCFE), Xi’an Institute of Flexible Electronics (IFE) & Xi’an Institute of Biomedical Materials and Engineering (IBME), Northwestern Polytechnical University (NPU), Xi’an 710072, China
Wei Huang
Frontiers Science Center for Flexible Electronics (FSCFE), Xi’an Institute of Flexible Electronics (IFE) & Xi’an Institute of Biomedical Materials and Engineering (IBME), Northwestern Polytechnical University (NPU), Xi’an 710072, China; Key Laboratory for Organic Electronics and Information Displays (KLOEID) and Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM), Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications (NUPT), Nanjing 210023, China; Key Laboratory of Flexible Electronics (KLOFE) & Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM), Jiangsu National Synergetic Innovation Center for Advanced Materials (SICAM), Nanjing Tech University (NanjingTech), Nanjing 211816, China
The emerging antimicrobial resistance (AMR) poses serious threats to the global public health. Conventional antibiotics have been eclipsed in combating with drug-resistant bacteria. Moreover, the developing and deploying of novel antimicrobial drugs have trudged, as few new antibiotics are being developed over time and even fewer of them can hit the market. Alternative therapeutic strategies to resolve the AMR crisis are urgently required. Pathogen-oriented therapy (POT) springs up as a promising approach in circumventing antibiotic resistance. The tactic underling POT is applying antibacterial compounds or materials directly to infected regions to treat specific bacteria species or strains with goals of improving the drug efficacy and reducing nontargeting and the development of drug resistance. This review exemplifies recent trends in the development of POTs for circumventing AMR, including the adoption of antibiotic-antibiotic conjugates, antimicrobial peptides, therapeutic monoclonal antibodies, nanotechnologies, CRISPR-Cas systems, and microbiota modulations. Employing these alternative approaches alone or in combination shows promising advantages for addressing the growing clinical embarrassment of antibiotics in fighting drug-resistant bacteria.