AUTHOR=Poulton Nicholas C. , Rock Jeremy M. 

TITLE=Unraveling the mechanisms of intrinsic drug resistance in Mycobacterium tuberculosis

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology

VOLUME=12

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/cellular-and-infection-microbiology/articles/10.3389/fcimb.2022.997283

DOI=10.3389/fcimb.2022.997283

ISSN=2235-2988

ABSTRACT=<p>Tuberculosis (TB) is among the most difficult infections to treat, requiring several months of multidrug therapy to produce a durable cure. The reasons necessitating long treatment times are complex and multifactorial. However, one major difficulty of treating TB is the resistance of the infecting bacterium, <italic>Mycobacterium tuberculosis</italic> (Mtb), to many distinct classes of antimicrobials. This review will focus on the major gaps in our understanding of intrinsic drug resistance in Mtb and how functional and chemical-genetics can help close those gaps. A better understanding of intrinsic drug resistance will help lay the foundation for strategies to disarm and circumvent these mechanisms to develop more potent antitubercular therapies.</p>