Fig. 1: Reduced C. albicans inocula cause significant damage compared to C. albicans in the presence of live L. rhamnosus that reduces pathogenicity contact-independently.

a Fungal burden assessed by quantification of C. albicans CFUs and b the necrotic cell damage of IECs quantified by LDH activity in supernatants at 24 h post infection (hpi). Cells were infected with a C. albicans infection inoculum (4 × 10⁵/ml) in the presence and absence of L. rhamnosus, or with a reduced infection inoculum (1 × 10⁴/ml) in the absence of L. rhamnosus (n = 3 biological repeats; L. rhamnosus colonized A * = p 0.0276, B * = p 0.0434 reduced inoculum A * = p 0.0225; B * = p 0.0434). c, d Necrotic cell damage of IECs quantified by LDH activity in supernatants at 24 hpi, (c) in the presence and absence of L. rhamnosus colonization and antibiotic treatment with Gentamicin and Penicillin/Streptomycin at 4 hpi (n = 4 biological repeats; * = p 0.0173 ns = 0.184), or (d) in the presence and absence of L. rhamnosus colonization where L. rhamnosus was in direct contact with the cells or physically separated using a transwell insert with a 0.4 µm pore size (n = 3 biological repeats; *** = p 0.0009, * = 0.048). Bars represent the mean and standard deviation of the independent experiments, dots represent the mean of the technical replicates of the individual experiments, biological repeats were compared for significance using an unpaired t-test (two-tailed, one-sample), * = p ≤ 0.05, ** = p ≤ 0.01, *** = p ≤ 0.001. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.