Summary
A biography of Louis Pasteur, from his beginnings as a scientist interested in crystallography to his pioneering work in infectious diseases.
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"...[this book] is a superior specimen of traditional narrative biography....Debre tells Pasteur's story with pace and flair. He paints the provincial and Paris backgrounds with a...vivid palette...and helpfully relates his hero to subsequent developments in microbiology." -- Roy Porter
-- Times Literary Supplement
Bibliographic Details
Publisher: Johns Hopkins Univ Pr
Published date: 1998
Size: 6.5 x 9.75 inches
Weight: 2.4 pounds
Pages: 552
Publisher's Notes
He is one of France's greatest national heroes. His discoveries in chemistry, bacteriology, and medicine opened new fields of research to generations of scientists and profoundly transformed the daily lives of all humanity. He pioneered the concept of rapid transfer of scientific information from the laboratory to industry for the benefit of his country and the world. He inspired and trained a generation of brilliant scientists who continued his revolutionary work and his traditions in the laboratory. And he established one of the world's first independent research institutes, which has since its founding been responsible for invaluable scientific and medical advances: the tuberculosis vaccine, the first sulfonamide drug, the first antihistamine, and the identification of the virus that causes AIDS. The significance and number of his accomplishments have transformed Louis Pasteur in the popular imagination into a scientific archetype, and the human drama behind these achievements—Pasteur's intuitive genius, his courage and determination, and his diligent and prodigious research, as well as his ego and dogmatism—have been obscured by hagiography.In Louis Pasteur, distinguished French immunologist and physician Patrice Debré offers the most extensive, balanced, and detailed account of the scientist's life, struggles, and contributions yet written. First published in France in 1994 to mark the centenary of Pasteur's death in 1895, Debré's biography draws heavily on Pasteur's own scientific notebooks and writings to present a complete critical account of his discoveries and of the controversies they raised with other scientists and occasionally with his closest associates. Debré provides an extremely well documented narrative of Pasteur's life and family, as well as his relations with the French government and the established scientific and medical communities. And he places Pasteur in historical context, describing the politics and culture of nineteenth-century France and sketching portraits of the other scientists whose life or work became intertwined with Pasteur's, including Marcelin Berthelot, Emile Littré, and Claude Bernard.Born in 1822, Pasteur began his professional life not as a physician or veterinarian but as a chemist specializing in crystallography. Nothing in his formal education prepared him for his pioneering efforts in microbiology and immunology. His research in the bacterial causes of fermentation in wine and beer, commissioned by Napoleon III, led naturally to his studies of contagion in humans begun during the cholera epidemic of 1865. At the same time, his studies of the diseases of the silkworm, also prompted by a request from the French government, eventually led him to the microbial theory that revolutionized the medical sciences. Pasteur had to struggle to convince his peers of the validity of his ideas and to be heard by physicians, who felt threatened by Pasteur's call for rethinking the relationship between medicine and science, between the world of research and that of treatment. He fought bravely and mercilessly against the erroneous notions of the spontaneous generation of microorganisms, strongly held by established scientists, and to introduce antiseptic procedures to protect patients against the dirty techniques of reputable surgeons. Later, he would establish the concept of bacterial virulence and the existence of attenuated strains, derived from the laboratory, which could be used to immunize effectively against of such scourges as anthrax, chicken cholera, and, most famously, rabies.Debré's book is more than an engrossing historical account, however, for Louis Pasteur's work is relevant to our own time. Pasteur's belief that basic research could not be totally separated from its practical applications was revolutionary in his age and continues to ignite debate today. Further, his view that medicine and science no longer could afford to ignore each other, and his emphasis on the links that must exist between the patient's bed and the scientist's microscope, still have a bearing on the preoccupations of modern science. Informative, stimulating, and highly readable, Louis Pasteur presents a compelling portrait of the scientist and convincingly demonstrates that the example of Pasteur's life remains an inspiring one.
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