Serial imaging of organisms captured directly from patient bioaerosol for up to two weeks.

Single bacilli identified from 4 separate patients were serially imaged daily for the first 7 days (except weekends) and weekly thereafter. Up to three bacilli were tracked per patient (bacilli number–represented by shape and dashed lines) in four patients (represented by colour) and identified as either “Putative Mtb” or “Other”. (A—C) Representative bacilli from two separate patients imaged on days 0, 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, and 14. (A) and (B) represent putative Mtb, whereas (C) represents other organisms with a low probability of being Mtb based on the applied inclusion criteria. Summary of bacterial changes in (D) length and (E) mean fluorescence intensity minus the average background intensity. Scale bar = 5μm.