Staphylococcus aureus is an important clinical pathogen that causes a high number of antibiotic-resistant infections. The study of S. aureus biology, and particularly of the function of essential proteins, is of particular importance to develop new approaches to combat this pathogen. We have optimized a clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat interference (CRISPRi) system that allows efficient targeting of essential S. aureus genes. Furthermore, we have used that system to construct a library comprising 261 strains, which allows the depletion of essential proteins encoded by 200 genes/operons. This library, which we have named Lisbon CRISPRi Mutant Library, should facilitate the study of S. aureus pathogenesis and biology.
Keywords: CRISPRi; Staphylococcus aureus; essential genes.