MCB 150 Lecture Hand-out# 2:

HISTORY OF MICROBIAL ECOLOGY

1. Observation of Microorganisms:

-
O v g - fungi
O v cells

Zacharias Janssen (1590s) developed the first compound microscope

Anton van Leeuwenhoek (1676) - made use of a single biconvex lens microscope (50-300x)
O v h w protozoa
first to see bacteria
described algae, yeasts and fungi

Ernst Karl Abbe (1878) - introduced the oil immersion objective

invented the system of lenses and mirrors which concentrates light on objects being viewed
Abbe condenser

Paul Ehrlich (1890) - improved visualization of bacteria through the use of stains
methylene blue

Hans Christian Gram (1884) - developed staining technique which divided the bacteria into two groups
Gram staining

2. Microorganisms as Living Entities:

Louis Pasteur (1857) - published a refutation of spontaneous generation

microscopic examination of wine containing yeast cells
v h w y
recommended the use of heat to control bacterial contamination
pasteurization

John Tyndall ( 1877) - gave the final blow to spontaneous generation theory
- observed that dust carries germs
- provided evidence for the existence heat-resistant forms of bacteria
- h y z

Ferdinand Cohn (1876) - discovered endospores

3. Role of Microorganisms:

Causing diseases: Indirect evidence that microorganisms were agents of human disease

Ignaz Semmelweis (1861)- hypothesized that childbed fever was transmitted by physicians
introduced the use of antiseptics

Joseph Lister (1867)- recommended that instruments should be heat-sterilized prior to use
introduced the use of phenol as disinfectant
Robert Koch ( 1876-1877)- first direct demonstration of the role of bacteria in causing disease
showed that Bacillus anthracis cause anthrax
isolated the bacterium that causes tuberculosis - Mycobacterium tuberculosis
v h K h which is a guide for relating specific microbes to
specific diseases

Production of Antimicrobial Substances:

Alexander Fleming - v h g Penicillium

Selman Waksman - discovered streptomycin from a mold-like bacillus Streptomyces

Role in Nature:
Nicolas-Theodore de Saussure
- reported on the capacity of soil to oxidize hydrogen gas

Jacques Theophile Schloesing and Achille Muntz

- ammonium in sewage was oxidized to nitrate when passed through a sand column

Sergei Winogradsky
- isolated and described nitrifying bacteria
- discovered microorganisms capable of inorganic chemical oxidation
- developed a model system for growing anaerobic photosynthetic and microaerophilic
bacteria
- described anaerobic nitrogen fixation

Martinus Beijerinck
- developed the enrichment culture
- isolated the first pure cultures of many soil bacteria
- reported on symbiotic and non-symbiotic N2 fixation