Fig. 2: The infectious biofilm aggregate.
a HE stained explanted lung tissue from a patient with cystic fibrosis. Image focused on a bronchial lumen. Green arrow indicates a non-attached bacterial aggregate, and the red arrow indicates a host immune cell associated with the aggregates. The unit of the scalebar refers to µm. b Schematic drawing of chronic biofilm infection in CF lungs. Bacteria grows as small non-attached aggregates (green cells), in obstructed bronchia filled with mucus surrounded by a multitude of innate immune cells (pink cells). The aggregates have been found to be unassociated with the epithelial lining (blue cells)27. c The neighboring slide of the image A, stained for P. aeruginosa with specific PNA-FISH probes and counterstained with blue DAPI. The green arrow indicate a red stained P. aeruginosa aggregate and red arrow shows the DAPI stained nucleus of an immune cell. The unit of the scalebar refers to µm. d aggregates of many infections have been found to grow slowly due to limited availability of oxygen due to high consumption from immune cells. a, c are adapted from81 with permission.
