Accidental discoveries in science





The discovery of antibiotics is the greatest event in the history of medicine. It was discovered accidentally by Alexander Fleming, a professor of bacteriology while doing some research on bacterial diseases in London in 1928.

 He was surprised to see that the bacteria he was trying to grow for his experiments were being killed by some mysterious growth that had settled on his culture plates. He found that it was the penicillium genus of moulds that generally grows on stale foodstuff. He published a paper on it and then forgot all, about it.

During World War II, Howard Florey and Ernest Chain, two Oxford doctors were looking for some more effective treatment for tile healing of war wounds.

They rediscovered Fleming’s report, set to work on it and extracted the essential substance. They named it penicillin, which is undoubtedly the most valuable 20th-century contribution to medicine. The two Oxford doctors shared with Fleming the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1945.

The two Oxford doctors shared with Fleming the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1945. Fleming and Florey were knighted in 1944. Fleming died in 1955. He is work opened up a vast new field of research; scientists all over the world began to work on all the known moulds.

Dr. S.A. Waksman, a Russian-born American doctor discovered streptomycin, for which he was awarded Nobel Prize in 1952.

Many other discoveries are accidental for example: X-rays were accidentally discovered by roentgen, Velcro was discovered by George De Mestral and so on.
Accidental discoveries in science Accidental discoveries in science Reviewed by knowledge people creators on January 25, 2020 Rating: 5
Powered by Blogger.