SCIENTISTS WHO HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO THE STUDY AND DEVELOPMENT OF MICROBIOLOGY AND

A PRESENTATION BY ANUPAMA. C.N 08CBT4057 SJASC

PART ONE

NUCLEIC ACIDS

INTRODUCTION
Nucleic acids are complex macromolecules of immense biological importance present in all living cells viruses. They control important biosynthetic activities of the cell and carry hereditary information from generation to generation. There are two types of nucleic acids namely

DNA (deoxyribose nucleic acids) and RNA (ribose nucleic acids).

Frederick Miescher (1868) was a Swiss biochemist. He discovered the nucleic acid when he was investigating the action of pepsin on pus cells which he bravely collected from the discarded hospital bandages. The undigested residue compound obtained from the nuclei of the pus cells was named by him as

It was however a man named Altmann who

coined the term nucleic acid because it was acidic in nature and extracted from the nature.

Later , the nucleic acid was subjected to chemical analysis by many scientists. Fischer (1880) identified the presence of nitrogen compounds-

Kossel then identified two types of purinesAdenine and Guanine and two types of pyramidines- Thymine and Cytosine . He was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1910 for this discovery.

A Russian biochemist named Levene recognized a fivecarbon ribose sugar and phospheric acid in nucleic acids.

In 1947, Chargaff made a detailed chemical analysis of DNA. He established the amount of Adenine is equivalent to the amount of Thymine and that of Guanine to Cytosine. This is called Chargaffs Law.

In 1950, Wilkins found out the physical nature of DNA through Xray diffraction method.

In 1967 Kornberg synthesized the DNA in the laboratory.

In 1953, working at the Cambridge University, London, James. D. Watson and F.H.C Crick constructed the Double Helix model (Duplex) of DNA based on its physiochemical nature.

Watson and Crick proposed the semiconservative hypothesis of DNA replication.

This was experimentally proved by Stahl and Meselson in 1958.

In 1928 Frederich Griffith conducted some experiments to show that the molecule of inheritance was DNA.

After 14

These findings were confirmed by other scientists namely Albert HersheyMartha Chase, MacLeod and McCarthy through experiments.

The Messenger RNA (mRNA) was first discovered by Volkin in the E.coli'.

Later in 1961 the term mRNA was coined by Jacob and Monad.

The clover leaf model of the Transfer RNA (tRNA) was proposed by Albert W Holley in 1964. He shared the Nobel Prize with H.G.Khorana and Nirenberg.

PART TWO

MICROBIOLOGY

Bacteria were first observed by Anton van Leeuwenhoek in 1676 using a single-lens microscope of his own design.

The name "bacterium" was introduced much later, by Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg in 1828, derived from the Greek word meaning "small stick".

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While van Leeuwenhoek is often cited as the first microbiologist, the first recorded microbiological observation, that of the fruiting bodies of molds, was made earlier in 1665 by Robert Hooke. He is credited with being the first person to

The field of bacteriology (later a subdiscipline of microbiology) is generally considered to have been founded by Ferdinand Cohn (18281898). Cohn was also the first to formulate a scheme for the taxonomic classification of

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Louise Pasteur

(18221895) is most famous for his series of experiments designed to disprove the then widely held theory of spontaneous generation, thereby solidifying microbiologys identity as a biological science. Pasteur also designed methods for food preservation (pasteurization) and vaccines against several diseases such

Robert Koch (1843

1910) is best known for his contributions to the germ theory of disease, proving that specific diseases were caused by specific pathogenic microorganisms. Koch was one of the first scientists to focus on the isolation of bacteria in pure culture resulting in his description of several novel bacteria including Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the causative agent of

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Martinus Beijerinck

(18511931) made two major contributions to microbiology: the discovery of viruses and the development of enrichment culture techniques. While his work on the Tobacco Mosaic Virus established the basic principles of virology, it was his development of enrichment culturing that had the most immediate impact on microbiology by allowing for the cultivation of a wide range of microbes with wildly different

Winogradsky (18561953)was the first to develop the concept of chemolithotrophy and to thereby reveal the essential role played by microorganisms in geochemical processes. He was responsible for the first isolation and description of both nitrifying and nitrogen-fixing

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The credit for the

invention of inoculation now goes to Edward Jenner who in 1796 injected cowhand James Phipps with cowpox. Jenner gets the credit because he carried out his work using accepted scientific method and wrote it up afterwards

Alexander Fleming discovered the pencillin.He was awarded the Nobel prize in 1945 for the discovery of penicillin

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Paul Ehrlich contributed a great deal to immunology. In 1905 he was awarded the nobel prize for work in immunity

BIBLIOGRAPHY
www.wikipedia.com www.scirus.com www.yahoo.com www.google.com www.nobleprize.com www.scientistsworld.com Text book of biology-expert series Microbiology-himalaya publications