FIGURE 5.

ALG-AgNPs effectively suppressed the growth of dormant-like bacilli in vitro. (A–B) The Mtb strain H37Rv was cultured with or without hypoxia to induce non-replicating persistence (NRP) or not. Then, the gene expression levels associated with the NRP state were assessed by QPCR, specifically (A) hspX and (B) esat-6. (C) The bacteria were treated with PBS, rifampicin (RIF) (1 μg/ml), isoniazid (INH) (0.2 μg/ml), or different amounts of ALG-AgNPs (25, 50, and 100 μg/ml) in the NRP state or not (O₂-replete) for 5 days. The bacterial growth was determined by CFU analysis on Middlebrook 7H10 agar and expressed as the number of CFU $\times$ 10⁴/ml. NRP: non-replicating persistence. RIF: rifampicin. INH: isoniazid. Data represent mean ± SEM of 3 experiments. *p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001.