Thursday, March 8, 2007

History Podcast of the Day- Microbiology


Latest from BBC’s In Our Time;

How did we first discover these invisible masters of the universe? The development of microscopes in the 17th Century played a key part, but for a while science seemed stuck in this purely observational role. It is only when Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch began to manipulate microbes in the lab two hundred years later that stunning advances were made. These breakthroughs led to an understanding of how microbes transform matter, spread disease and also prevent it with the development of antibiotics and vaccines.

So what do we know about how microbes operate? How can they contribute to environmental stability? How do advances in genetics in microbiology help our treatment of diseases like cancer?

Listen to the podcast.

*The graphic is from NYT article- In Lice, Clues to Human Origin and Attire

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