Alexander Bell and Penicillin

ALEXANDER BELL served in the British Army Medical Corps in WW1. He was deeply affected seeing at first-hand the deaths from infection. He realised that the antiseptics used on deep wounds caused harm.

After the war in 1923 he identified the natural enzyme Lysozyme.

This substance has antibacterial properties, but it had limited success.

In 1928, a chance discovery changed everything. He had failed to clean his laboratory leaving several compounds on un-cleaned, Petri dishes, containing the bacterium in the laboratory sink.

He noticed one of the dishes was contaminated with a mould. The area around it was free of bacteria. He grew more samples. It was killing the bacteria by secreting an antibiotic substance. This mould was known, it was used in mouldy bread for infection.

In 1929, Fleming published his findings, the mould was difficult to cultivate. The quantities produced were small had a short storage life.

In 1939, a breakthrough radically improved the production of Penicillin.

Finally, it could be made in large quantities, for treatment against a wide range of bacterial infections, including Meningitis, Scarlet Fever, pneumonia, and other infections that caused global deaths.

What once had been unimaginable, had produced dramatic results. The landscape of Medicine was changed, millions of lives were saved.

The overuse of anti-bacteria drugs has currently reduced its effectiveness. Research is underway to produce super drugs to avoid bacterial resistance, by screening many synthetic and natural compounds with antibiotic properties, using whole-genome anti-resistant microbes throughout different populations.