Louis Pasteur

In Our Time: Science

BBC

History

4.5 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 18 May 2017

⏱️ 52 minutes

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Summary

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the life and work of Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) and his extraordinary contribution to medicine and science. It is said few people have saved more lives than Pasteur. A chemist, he showed that otherwise identical molecules could exist as 'left' and 'right-handed' versions and that molecules produced by living things were always left-handed. He proposed a germ theory to replace the idea of spontaneous generation. He discovered that microorganisms cause fermentation and disease. He began the process named after him, pasteurisation, heating liquids to 50-60 C to kill microbes. He saved the beer and wine industries in France when they were struggling with microbial contamination. He saved the French silk industry when he found a way of protecting healthy silkworm eggs from disease. He developed vaccines against anthrax and rabies and helped establish immunology. Many of his ideas were developed further after his lifetime, but one of his legacies was a charitable body, the Pasteur Institute, to continue research into infectious disease. With Andrew Mendelsohn Reader in the School of History at Queen Mary, University of London Anne Hardy Honorary Professor at the Centre for History in Public Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and Michael Worboys Emeritus Professor in the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester Producer: Simon Tillotson.

Transcript

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0:46.1	Hello Louis Pasteur born in France in 1822 is one of the great scientists of the 19th century
0:51.8	and his work still has a profound impact on our lives today.
0:56.0	He was the first to manufacture a vaccine tackling anthrax and then rabies which led to the development
1:01.3	of vaccines for other diseases.
1:03.2	His research persuaded surgeons of the need for antiseptics to stop organisms in the air infecting open wounds.
1:09.2	He discovered why wine, beer and milk can go off before they're ready to drink and found a way to preserve
1:15.5	them known as pasteurization.
1:18.0	By the time of his death in 1895, he was known as one of the founders of microbiology. He cut across disciplines, there were he said no such
1:25.1	things as pure and applied signs. There were only signs and the application of signs.
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