CRISPR–Cas Against Antimicrobial-Resistant Pathogens

Our ability to treat infectious diseases and create new antibiotics is hampered by the rapid emergence of bacteria resistant to antibiotics. One of the innovative methods for handling antibiotic-resistant strains is the utilization of the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat-associated system (CRISPR–Cas), which serves as an adaptive immune system for bacteria. When applied to bacterial genomic regions, the programmable Cas nuclease in this technology has the potential to be extremely lethal toward or beneficial in decreasing antibiotic resistance. The goal of this book chapter is to examine the process of promoting bacterial antibiotic sensitization through the CRISPR–Cas system. The use of CRISPR–Cas methods could lead to the development of intelligent antibiotics that can identify harmful benign microorganisms and end multidrug-resistant (MDR) infections. These systems offer opportunities for studying the microbial consortia, controlling industrial fermentation, and treating infections resistant to various medications. They possess the capacity to eliminate particular bacterial strains in a sequence-specific manner, both quantitatively and selectively.