ABSTRACT Increasing antibiotic resistance is a global health problem. In recent years, due to the indiscriminate use of antibacterial compounds, many bacterial pathogens, including staphylococci, members of the Enterobacteriaceae family including Klebsiella pneumoniae and bacteria such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumannii have become multi-drug resistant. Consequently, it is important to explore alternative approaches for eliminating resistant strains. Bacteria synthesize low-weight molecules called siderophores to chelate iron from the environment as a vital element for their growth and survival. One way to deal with resistant bacterial strains is to utilize siderophore-mediated iron uptake pathways as entrance routes for drug delivery. Therefore, the production of drugs with Trojan horse strategy in the form of conjugated siderophore-antibiotic complexes has recently received much attention for dealing with resistant isolates. In this review, we discuss the efficacy of siderophore-antibiotic conjugates as a Trojan horse strategy for eliminating drug-resistant pathogens.
