penicillin

• Antibiotic


  A substance that fights bacterial infections
• Alexander Fleming


  • Military doctor in World War 1
  • Experienced frustration and tragedy of men dying from blood poisoning and staphylococcus infections
  • Determined to find a solution and cure for these infections
  • Worked at St Mary's Hospital in London researching anti-antibiotics
• Fleming's discovery of penicillin

  1. Went on holiday

  2. Returned to find mold culture dish with white mold preventing growth of other mold

  3. Identified the penicillium bacterium

  4. Discovered penicillin worked as an antibiotic medicine
• Fleming published his ideas and tried to make a practical medicine out of penicillin
• Fleming's work was not initially taken seriously as penicillin was seen as impossible to make and therefore impractical
• Penicillin


  • Chemical antiseptics could kill many infections but did not heal infections caused by streptococci and staphylococci bacteria
  • Soldiers with those infections died
• Fleming's discovery of penicillin

  1. Left dishes containing bacteria on lab bench

  2. Noticed mold on one dish

  3. Staphylococci bacteria had disappeared around the mold

  4. Experimented with penicillin mold on living cells

  5. Discovered it killed bacteria without harming other cells

  6. Made a list of germs it killed

  7. Used it to treat a colleague's eye infection
• Fleming wrote about penicillin in a medical journal but nobody thought it was important as he had not used it on animals to heal infections
• Florian and Chain's research and trials

  • Realized penicillin could be very effective
  • Got 25 pounds of funding from the government
  • Discovered penicillin helped mice recover from infections
  • Needed 3000 times as much penicillin to treat one person
  • Large drug companies could not afford to fund this quantity of work
  • Grew penicillin themselves using hundreds of hospital bedpans
• Florian and Chain's first use of penicillin

  1. Tested on volunteer Albert Alexander who had developed septicemia

  2. Penicillin worked and Albert began to recover

  3. Ran out of penicillin after 5 days and Albert died
• Penicillin had shown it worked and wasn't harmful, they just needed to find a way to make enough of it
• Wartime need for penicillin

  1. English factories couldn't be used for mass production

  2. Florian went to America

  3. American government made interest-free loans to US companies to buy equipment for making penicillin

  4. British firms also started mass producing penicillin

  5. Enough to treat all Allied wounded on D-Day in 1944
• Lieutenant Colonel Pulvertaft: 'We had enormous numbers of infected wounded terrible Burns cases among the crews of the Armored Cars sulfonomites had absolutely no effect on these cases the last thing I tried was Penicillin the first one I tried it on was a young New Zealand officer called Newton he had been in bed for six months with compound fractures to both legs his sheets were soaked with pus and the heat of Cairo made the smell intolerable normally he would have died in a short time I gave three injections a day of penicillin and studied the effects under a microscope the thing seemed like a miracle in 10 days the leg was cured and in a month's time the young fellow was back on his feet I had enough penicillin for 10 cases 9 out of the ten were complete cures'
• After World War II, penicillin began to be manufactured and used by everyone, not just the Armed Forces
• Antibiotics became more and more common in the 1950s and 1960s, gradually turning from a wonder drug to an ordinary everyday lifesaver
• Development of penicillin


  • Chance - Fleming's discovery was essentially by chance
  • War - The Second World War provided the need for penicillin to save soldiers' lives
  • Governments - Recognized the importance of penicillin and provided funding to develop it
  • Science and technology - Scientific inquiry and discovery allowed penicillin to be tested, proved and developed quickly
  • Individual genius - Fleming discovered penicillin but Florian and Chain demonstrated how it could become a practical medicine