Airborne Mycobacterium tuberculosis inactivated by advanced photohydrolysis technology

Tuberculosis is a respiratory infectious disease that persists worldwide, largely due to the robustness and ease of dissemination of its causative agent, Mycobacterium tuberculosis. To mitigate the spread of infection, various measures have been developed to inactivate the bacteria in its aerosol form. Advanced photohydrolysis technology (APHT) was previously reported to inactivate both respiratory viral and bacterial pathogens; however, its efficacy against M. tuberculosis has yet to be evaluated. In this study, we assessed the ability of APHT to inactivate aerosolized M. tuberculosis. The bacteria were aerosolized into a custom chamber containing an APHT device, which was operated for 1 and 10 min after aerosolization. A control device lacking the APHT component was used for comparison. The APHT device achieved a 1.3-log10 reduction (approximately 95%) in bacterial load after 1 min and a 2.26-log10 reduction (over 99%) after 10 min. This study demonstrates the ability of APHT to inactivate aerosolized M. tuberculosis and supports its application as a possible effective infection control intervention.