Figure 4.

Impact of NO-np on fungal growth and morphogenesis. (A) Time-lapse (0–60 min) microscopy was used to explore the effect of NO-np on C. albicans cell division and morphological transformation. White single arrow heads indicate budding yeast and/or pseudohyphae whereas white double arrow heads indicate nanoparticle aggregates. Images were collected at 40×. Scale bar: 10 μm. (B) Time-lapse microscopy images of untreated, np, and NO-np groups at 120 min. Images collected at 40×. Scale bar: 10 μm. (C) XTT reduction assay was used to measure the metabolic activity of NO-np-treated filamentous C. albicans in vitro. The 100% activity was set as the measurements in wells with filamentous fungi without the addition of either NO-np or np. Bars represent the average of the results and error bars denote standard deviations. Asterisks denote P value significance (**P < 0.001) calculated by analysis of variance and adjusted by use of the Bonferroni correction. These experiments were performed twice with similar results.