A new series of reviews, the inaugural installment of Antimicrobial Therapeutics Reviews will be published in the fall of 2010. Among the topics discussed will be: antibiotic cycling (rotation) to reduce emergence of resistance; antibiotics: past and future medical need and public perception; drug discovery successes and failures; efflux pumps and the possibility for broad-spectrum inhibitors; emergence of Clostridium difficile as a major nosocomial pathogen; immunomodulators as adjuvants for antimicrobial therapy and vaccines; potential impact of rapid diagnostics to direct more targeted therapies, or to affect antimicrobial use; regulatory hurdles for new antibiotics; the interface between veterinary and human antibiotic use; and virtual high throughput screening and structure-based design of anti-bacterials.