"Sometimes one discovers what one is not looking for," Alexander Fleming said matter-of-factly about discovering penicillin, the "miracle drug" of mankind.

By chance, the journey to discover the world's first antibiotic began with a moldy culture dish and led to treatments for serious, deadly diseases.

According to Healio, in 1927, Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming was analyzing staphylococcus bacteria at the Vaccination Department laboratory at St. Mary's Hospital, London (UK). Before that, he was famous for discovering lysozyme and was considered an excellent researcher.

Alexander Fleming in the laboratory. Photo: loc.gov.

Careless and absent-minded, Fleming often left his laboratory in disarray. Before the summer break of 1928, he simply stacked batches of staphylococcus bacteria on a bench in the corner of the laboratory without cleaning them. When he returned, the scientist discovered that one batch had become moldy. After examining it under a microscope, Fleming found that the mold had inhibited the growth of the bacteria, causing them to "become transparent and visibly diminished."

"It's funny," Fleming commented on the phenomenon he witnessed. The scientist spent several more weeks cultivating more mold. He identified the mold as belonging to the Penicillium family and named the substance it secreted penicillin on March 7, 1929. Fleming noted that penicillin affected bacteria such as staphylococcus and many gram-positive pathogens that lead to erythema, pneumonia, meningitis, and leukemia, but did not kill gram-negative pathogens except Neisseria gonorrhoeae, which causes gonorrhea.

Fleming came to a conclusion that shocked the medical world: Certain elements in penicillin not only inhibited bacterial growth but, more importantly, also fought infectious diseases. "When I awoke in the early morning of September 28, 1918, I had absolutely no intention of revolutionizing the world by discovering the world's first antibiotic or bactericide," he said of the turning point in his life. "But that seems to be exactly what I did."

Fleming published his discovery in 1929 in the British Journal of Experimental Pathology, but it did not attract attention. He continued his research, but culturing and isolating it was very difficult. In addition, the ability of crude penicillin to treat infected wounds was relatively limited, and scientists were convinced that penicillin did not remain in the body long enough to effectively kill bacteria. Fleming pursued this work until 1940, then decided to abandon it in order to call on qualified chemists to join.

Shortly thereafter, with the support of the British and American governments and the discoveries of Fleming, Howard Florey and Ernst Boris Chain at Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, penicillin was successfully refined. In March 1942, Anne Miller became the first citizen to be cured by antibiotics. Penicillin was mass produced after the attack on Pearl Harbor, and by 1944, enough was available for all wounded Allied soldiers. As a result, the mortality rate from bacterial pneumonia dropped from 18% in World War I to less than 1% in World War II. By the end of the war, American pharmaceutical companies were producing 650 billion units of penicillin per month.

Since 1941, the scientific community returned to read Alexander Fleming's articles and recognized him as the discoverer of penicillin. In 1945, Fleming, Florey, and Chain received the Nobel Prize in Medicine. "Sometimes people discover things they never expected," the father of antibiotics calmly commented. At the same time, he warned that overuse of penicillin could lead to antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

Today, the laboratory where Fleming researched penicillin is preserved as a museum. His work from a moment of absent-mindedness changed the world in an amazing way and to this day, still exists as the "miracle cure".

According to VnExpress