who is the father of antibiotics?

Question

Alexander fleming

Answer 1

It depends on how you look at it.

Alexander Fleming observed penicillin's effects on bacterial cultures, and is credited with discovering it. However, production of penicillin was extremely difficult--in its earliest days, penicillin was recrystallized out of the urine of people who were given it, it was so hard to make--and it was too tough to produce to be useful clinically.

Arguably the "parent" of antibiotics is the National Center for Agriculture Utilization Research (affectionately known as the Ag Lab) in Peoria, Illinois. It was there that the vat fermentation technology that made it possible to produce huge volumes of penicillin (and later, it was modified to produce the tetracyclines, the aminoglycosides, vancomycin, the macrolides and the cephalosporins) was developed, and then licensed to Pfizer Pharmaceuticals.

If the antibiotics industry, however, has a single human parent, it is a lady named Mary (last name not known to me) who was hired by the Ag Lab to find samples of molds of the Penicillium genus (which produces penicillin). Mary found a cantaloupe (a muskmelon grown in Spring Bay Illinois, if you're interested) with some Penicillium mold growing at the stem. That isolate of Penicillium crysodigium was the mutant strain that made mass production of penicillin possible... and that therefore began the antibiotics industry as we know it.

HOWEVER, sulfonamides (a totally synthetic antibiotic) were in use before penicillin was--so it is doubtful that the antibiotic industry found its origin in the penicillins, even though it's usually accredited with being that way.

Note also that in Medieval England, a loaf of bread was allowed to molder in the rafters; the stump end would be sliced off and applied to an open wound: likely, that was an application of small dose penicillin, since many of the bread molds are genus Penicillium...

Answer 2

Although the principles of antibiotic action were not discovered until the twentieth century, the first known use of antibiotics was by the ancient Chinese over 2,500 years ago.[1] Many other ancient cultures, including the ancient Egyptians and ancient Greeks already used molds and plants to treat infections. This worked because some molds produce antibiotic substances. However, they couldn't distinguish or distill the active component in the molds.

Modern research on antibiotic therapy began in Germany with the development of the narrow-spectrum antibiotic Salvarsan by Paul Ehrlich in 1909, for the first time allowing an efficient treatment of the then-widespread problem of Syphilis. The drug, which was also effective against other spirochaetal infections, is no longer in use in modern medicine.

Antibiotics were further developed in Britain following the discovery of Penicillin in 1928 by Alexander Fleming. More than ten years later, Ernst Chain and Howard Florey became interested in his work, and came up with the purified form of penicillin. The three shared the 1945 Nobel Prize in Medicine. "Antibiotic" was originally used to refer only to substances extracted from a fungus or other microorganism, but has come to include also the many synthetic and semi-synthetic drugs that have antibacterial effects.

Answer 3

The first known use of antibiotics was by the ancient Chinese over 2,500 years ago. Many other ancient cultures, including the ancient Egyptians and ancient Greeks already used molds and plants to treat infections. This worked because some molds produce antibiotic substances. However, they couldn't distinguish or distill the active component in the molds.

Modern research on antibiotic therapy began in Germany with the development of the narrow-spectrum antibiotic Salvarsan by Paul Ehrlich in 1909, for the first time allowing an efficient treatment of the then-widespread problem of Syphilis. The drug, which was also effective against other spirochaetal infections, is no longer in use in modern medicine.

Antibiotics were further developed in Britain following the discovery of Penicillin in 1928 by Alexander Fleming. More than ten years later, Ernst Chain and Howard Florey became interested in his work, and came up with the purified form of penicillin. The three shared the 1945 Nobel Prize in Medicine.

Term "Antibiotic" was coind by an Ukrainian-American biochemist and microbiologist Selman Abraham Waksman in 1940 and was originally used to refer only to substances extracted from a fungus or other microorganism, but has come to include also the many synthetic and semi-synthetic drugs that have antibacterial effects

Answer 4

Sir Alexander Fleming 1928

Answer 5

Alexander Fleming is known as the father of antibiotics as he is also the discoverer of the antibiotic PENICILLIN derived from the fungus penicillium notatum. It was the first ever antiiotic and saved many lives.

Answer 6

Ernest Duchesne is the father of antibiotics. He discovered penicillin in 1897. Unfortunately due to his age (he was only 23) the discovery wasn t taken seriously. In 1949, five years after Fleming, Chain and Florey received the Nobel Peace Prize, Duchesne was posthumously honoured as the original discoverer.

http://www.drmirkin.com/histories-and-mysteries/ernest-duchesne-the-father-of-antibiotics.html

Answer 7

Selman Waksman: the Father of Antibiotics

Answer 8

Selman Waksman: the Father of Antibiotics

The Chemical Nature of Actinomycin, an Anti-microbial Substance Produced by Actinomyces Antibioticus (Waksman, S. A., and Tishler, M. (1942) J. Biol. Chem. 142, 519-528)

Selman Abraham Waksman (1888-1973) was born in the rural Ukrainian town of Novaya Priluka. The town and its nearby villages were surrounded by a rich black soil that supported abundant agricultural life. Although Waksman did not do much farming as a child, the chemistry of the fertile soil incited a curiosity in him that would eventually influence the direction of his future endeavors.

In 1910, after completing his matriculation diploma, Waksman followed the example of several relatives and migrated to the United States. He worked for a few years on a family farm in New Jersey and then enrolled in Rutgers College. There he studied bacteria in culture samples from successive soil layers, which resulted in his introduction to the actinomycetes. These bacteria became an enduring interest that Waksman studied for both his Master's and Doctorate degrees and on which he would eventually become a major expert.

After receiving his doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1918, Waksman secured a position at the Rutgers Bacteriology Department where he continued his research on soil microflora. Several years later, a young French biologist named Rene Dubois joined his laboratory. By 1927, Dubois was studying the one-on-one effects of soil organisms in decomposing cellulose and was beginning an approach that would lead to modern antibiotics. In collaboration with Oswald Avery at the Rockefeller Institute Hospital, Dubois isolated a soil bacterium that could attack the capsular polysaccharide of Streptococcus pneumoniae (1). This discovery inspired Waksman to look for more pre-existing antibacterial organisms in soil samples.

By 1940, Waksman and H. Boyd Woodruff had devised a technique for identifying natural substances with antibacterial properties (2). The screening was done by looking for growth inhibition zones around single colonies of systematically isolated soil microbes, grown under a variety of culture conditions, and then testing the inhibition on specifically targeted pathogenic bacteria.

The first true antibiotic Waksman identified was from Actinomyces antibioticus, a member of the actinomycetes family (3). The microbe produced a substance, actinomycin, that had both bacteriostatic and bactericidal properties. Waksman and Woodruff determined that actinomycin could be separated with petroleum ether into two constituents, an orange-red colored actinomycin A and a colorless actinomycin B. Actinomycin A had strong bacteriostatic and bactericidal properties whereas actinomycin B displayed only bactericidal characteristics.

In the Journal of Biological Chemistry (JBC) Classic reprinted here, Waksman and Max Tishler, who was featured in a previous JBC Classic (4), describe the nature and properties of actinomycin A. The pair found that actinomycin is a quinine-like pigment with a molecular formula of either C41H56N8O11, C37H50N7O10, or C36H49N7O9·H2O. The compound is highly active against various gram-positive bacteria but less active against gram-negative organisms. Unfortunately, Waksman and Tishler also discovered that actinomycin is extremely toxic to experimental animals and thus of little therapeutic value.

Waksman followed this initial failure with a comprehensive program of screening actinomycetes for their ability to produce antibacterials. He identified more than 20 new natural inhibitory substances, including streptomycin and neomycin, and proposed the now standard term "antibiotics" for this class of natural growth inhibitors.

Answer 9

I remember the story of the first successful patient treated by antibiotics. He was a policeman who was clearing the rain gutters on his house, and he fell into the rose bushes. He was badly cut up by the thorns. In those days they had no way of treating infections that are routinely treated today. He lapsed into a coma. With no hope otherwise available he was given the experimental drug called Penicillin. He recovered, and went on to live a normal life.

Sounds crazy by today's standards, but in those days (1930's) nothing else could be done for him. This incident established the first clear proof that Penicillin worked.

PBS did a show on this. if you look on their website I would think you might find more detailed information.

Answer 10

I think Selman Waksman who discovered streptomycin, is the Father of Antibiotics.