Milestones in Microbiology

Other landmarks and discoveries in the field of microbiology are summarized in Table 1.

Table 1. Synopsis of some milestones in microbiology

EventDiscovererDate
Discovery of Petri dish (plate)Richard Petri1887
Discovery of nutrient agar (agar-agar)Fanny A. Eilshemius & Dr. Walter Hesse1881
Release of first edition of Bargey’s Manual Professor David Bergey1923
Discovery of Archaea using rRNA analysis  Carl Woese & George Fox1977
Discovery of bacterial conjugationEdward Tatum & Joshua Lederberg1946
Discovery of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)Luc Montagnier1983
Discovery of transposable elementsBarbara McClintock1951
Discovery of immunoglobulin structureRodney Porter1959
First discovery of yellow fever virusWalter Reed1900
Discovery of monoclonal antibodiesGeorges Kohler & Cesar Milstein1975
Discovery of sulfanilamide & sulpha drugsGerhard Domagk1935
Proposed germ theory of diseaseFriedrich Henle1840
Discovery of the ribosomes as sites of protein synthesisSydney Brenne, Francois Jacob and Matthew Meselson1961
Discovery of streptomycinSelman Waksman & Albert Schatz1943
Discovery of bacteriophages Frederick Twort1915
First cultivation of viruses in cell cultureJohn Enders1946
Discovery of diphtheria antitoxinEmil von Behring & Shibasaburo Kitasato1890
Discovery of plasmid DNAStanley Cohen, Annie Chang, Robert Helling and Herbert Boyer1973
First discovery of zoonoses (Babesiosis)Theobald Smith and F.L. Kilbourne1893
Discovery of human blood groupsKarl Landsteiner1901
Crystallization of tobacco mosaic virus (TMV)Wendell Stanley1935
Discovery of first cancer virusFrancis Rous1911
Discovery of lac operonFrancois Jacob, David Perrin, Carmen Sanchez and Jacques Monod1960
Discovery of polymerase chain reaction (PCR)Kary Mullis1985
Discovery of Taq polymeraseThomas Brock & Hudson Freeze1969
Discovery of the genetic codeMarshall Nirenberg & Gobind H. Khorana1966
Discovery of restriction enzymes or endonucleases Hamilton Smith & David Nathans1970
Discovery of DNA sequencingFred Sanger, Steven Niklen & Alan Coulson1977
Discovery of clonal selection theoryMacfarlane F. Burnet1959
Discovery of reverse transcriptaseHoward Temin, David Baltimore & Renato Dulbeccco1969
Discovery of prionsStanley Prusiner1981
Discovery of bacterial transductionJoshua Lederberg & Norton Zinder1952

References

Barrett   J.T (1998).  Microbiology and Immunology Concepts.  Philadelphia,   PA:  Lippincott-Raven Publishers. USA.

Beck R.W (2000). A chronology of microbiology in historical context. Washington, D.C.: ASM Press.

Brooks G.F., Butel J.S and Morse S.A (2004). Medical Microbiology, 23rd edition. McGraw Hill Publishers. USA. Pp. 248-260.

Chung K.T, Stevens Jr., S.E and Ferris D.H (1995). A chronology of events and pioneers of microbiology. SIM News, 45(1):3–13.

Nester E.W, Anderson D.G, Roberts C.E and Nester M.T (2009). Microbiology: A Human Perspective. Sixth edition. McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc, New York, USA.

Salyers A.A and Whitt D.D (2001). Microbiology: diversity, disease, and the environment. Fitzgerald Science Press Inc. Maryland, USA.

Slonczewski J.L, Foster J.W and Gillen K.M (2011). Microbiology: An Evolving Science. Second edition. W.W. Norton and Company, Inc, New York, USA.

Summers W.C (2000). History of microbiology. In Encyclopedia of microbiology, vol. 2, J. Lederberg, editor, 677–97. San Diego: Academic Press.

Talaro, Kathleen P (2005). Foundations in Microbiology. 5th edition. McGraw-Hill Companies Inc., New York, USA.

Wainwright M (2003). An Alternative View of the Early History of Microbiology. Advances in applied microbiology. Advances in Applied Microbiology, 52:333–355.

Willey J.M, Sherwood L.M and Woolverton C.J (2008). Harley and Klein’s Microbiology. 7th ed. McGraw-Hill Higher Education, USA.


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