Louis Pasteur: Greatest Achievements

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Louis Pasteur: Greatest Achievements

Louis Pasteur was one of the most important scientists of our time. The foundation of our knowledge about health and disease comes from the discoveries of this one man. He made many discoveries and solutions for problems of the every day life that are still in effect today.

Pasteur was born on December 27, 1822 in a little town called Dôle in the foothills of the Jura Mountains of eastern France. When he was five years old his family moved to Arbois where he grew up with his father, mother, and three sisters. While attending primary school Pasteur was only an average student. Some considered him to be slow because he worked so hard on an exercise problem to make sure that he had the right answer. While in high school Monsieur Romanet, Pasteur’s principal, became interested in Pasteur and began to help him with his studies. With this encouragement Pasteur became a very good student. The principal suggested that he aim to attend Ecole Normale in Paris where he could become a professor at one of the great universities, however his father felt that this was far-fetched and preferred that Pasteur attend a more local school (Burton, 5-7).

Although his father had other plans for him, Pasteur had the opportunity to attend a preparatory school in Paris before going on to Ecole Normale, however when he got to Paris he became very homesick and his father soon arrived to take him home. After returning to Arbois Pasteur attended a local school named Besancon where he worked very hard and became one of the top students in his class. In 1842 Pasteur passed the admission tests to attend Ecole Normale however he was rated fifteenth of twenty-two candidates and this was not good enough to satisfy him. He continued to study and finally in 1843 Pasteur sailed through his admission tests and was awarded fourth place among the other candidates (Burton, 7-11).

Although Pasteur is sometimes considered to be the father of microbiology and immunology, he actually launched his career as a chemist who studied the shapes of organic crystals. Crystallography was just emerging as a branch of chemistry and his project was to crystalize a number of organic compounds. While working on this project he began...

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..., the boy made a full recovery (Nicolle, 199-200).

After making his discovery about rabies his health began to deteriorate and he suffered from paralysis on his left side from a serious stroke. This made his work in the laboratory extremely difficult. Pasteur died in 1895 after suffering from additional strokes. Pasteur was a great man with a great mind. Because of his many discoveries there are many people that owe him their lives. Without his brilliance the medical sciences would be at a complete loss today.

Works Cited

Benz, Francis E.. Pasteur Knight of the Laboratory. New York, New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1938. 73-141.

Burton, Mary June. Louis Pasteur Founder of Microbiology. New York, New York: Franklin Watts, Inc., 1963. 5-77.

Cohn, David V.. “The Life and Times of Louis Pasteur.” University of Louisville School of Dentistry. 11 Feb. 1996. 45 pars. 7 Mar. 2004.

Nicolle, Jacques. Louis Pasteur The Story of His Major Discoveries. New York, New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1961. 192-200.