microbiology discoverers and stalwarts

Some stalwarts in

MicrobiologyDr. Abhijeet ManeAssistant Professor

Department of MicrobiologyBVDUMC, Pune

Robert Heinrich Herman Koch(1843-1910)

• German Bacteriologist• Introduced staining

techniques• Introduced methods of

obtaining bacteria in pure culture using solid media

• Discovered bacillus of tuberculosis, Bacillus and the cholera vibrio

• Gave the Koch’s postulates

• Received Nobel prize in Medicine in 1905

Antony van Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723)

• draper in Delft, Holland

• In 1683, made accurate description of various types of bacteria

• He called them “little animacules”

Daniel Elmer Salmon (1850-1914)

• A veterinary surgeon• Genus Salmonella

named after him by his assistant Theobald Smith in 1885

Theodor Albrecht Edwin Klebs (1834-1913)

• German – Swiss pathologist

• First to identify Corynebacterium diphtheriae

• Genus Klebsiella named in honor of his extensive work on the same

Theodor Escherich (1857-1911)

German-Austrian PediatricianDiscovered bacterium Escherichia coli

Escherich’s monograph on relationship of intestinal bacteria to the physiology of digestion in the infant

which became his habilitation treatise

Filippo Pacini (1812-1883)

-Italian Anatomist-First observed Vibrio cholerae

This microscope slide prepared by Pacini in 1854 was clearly identified as containing the Cholera bacillus

Sir Frank Macfarlane Burnet (1899-1985)

• Australian virologist & immunologist

• Identified causative agent of Q fever

• Gave Burnet’s clonal selection theory

• Shared Nobel prize with Sir Peter Medawar (1960) for discovering acquired immunological tolerance

Kiyoshi Shiga (1871-1957)

• Japanese researcher• Discovered Shigella

dysentriae, bacillus causing dysentery

Louis Pasteur (1822-1895)

• French Chemist• Established that

fermentation was a result of bacterial activity

• Proved that all forms of life, even microbes, arose only from their like & not de novo

• introduced techniques of sterilization, etc.

Barry Marshal (1951-) & Robin Warren (1937-)

shared Nobel prize in Medicine (2005) for discovery of Helicobacter

Pylori

Australian Physician Australian Pathologist

Kary Mullis (1944 - )• American Biochemist• Shared Nobel prize in

Chemistry (1993) for invention of Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR)

Ronald Ross (1857-1932)

• British Medical Doctor• Born in India• Received Nobel prize

in 1902 in Medicine for discovery of malarial parasites in GI tract of mosquito thus proving malaria is transmitted by mosquito

Albert Ludwig Sigesmund Neisser

(1855-1916)• German Physician• Discovered causative

agent of Gonorrhea

Gerhard Henrik Armauer Hansen(1841-1912)

• Norwegian Physician• Identified the

bacterium Mycobacterium leprae as causative agent of Leprosy

Alexander Ogston (1844-1929)

• Scottish Surgeon• Discovered bacterium

Staphylococcus

Rebecca Craighill Lancefield(1895-1981)

• Prominent American Microbiologist

• Famous for her classification of beta hemolytic streptococci, called Lancefield Grouping.

Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis(1818-1865)

• Hungarian Physician• Known as an early

pioneer of antiseptic procedures

• Proposed the practice of washing hands with chlorinated lime solutions in obstetrical clinics in 1847 to reduce incidence of puerperal fever