Louis pasteur 2
Louis pasteur 2PASTEUR, Louis (1822-95). The French chemist Louis Pasteur devoted his life to solving practical problems of industry, agriculture, and medicine. His discoveries have saved countless lives and created new wealth for the world. Among his discoveries are the pasteurization process and ways of preventing silkworm diseases, anthrax, chicken cholera, and rabies.
Pasteur sought no profits from his discoveries, and he supported his family on his professor's salary or on a modest government allowance. In the laboratory he was a calm and exact worker; but once sure of his findings, he vigorously defended them. Pasteur was an ardent patriot, zealous in his ambition to make France great through science.
Scholar and Scientist
Louis Pasteur was born on Dec. 27, 1822, in D�le, France. His father was a tanner. In 1827 the family moved to nearby Arbois, where Louis went to school. He was a hard-working pupil but not an especially brilliant one.
When he was 17 he received a degree of bachelor of letters at the Coll�ge Royal de Besan�on. For the next three years he tutored younger students and prepared for the �cole Normale Sup�rieure, a noted teacher-training college in Paris. As part of his studies he investigated the crystallographic, chemical, and optical properties of various forms of tartaric acid. His work laid the foundations for later study of the geometry of chemical bonds. Pasteur's investigations soon brought him recognition and also an appointment as assistant to a professor of chemistry.
Pasteur received a doctor of science degree in 1847 and was appointed professor of chemistry at the University of Strasbourg. Here he met Marie Laurent, daughter of the rector of the university. They were married in 1849. Pasteur's wife shared his love for science. They had five children; three died in childhood.
Research in Fermentation and Souring
In 1854 Pasteur became professor of chemistry and dean of the school of science (Facult� des Sciences) at the University of Lille. Hearing of Pasteur's ability, a local distiller came to him for help in controlling the process of making alcohol by fermenting beet sugar. Pasteur saw that fermentation was not a simple chemical reaction but took place only in the presence of living organisms. He learned that fermentation, putrefaction, infection, and souring are caused by germs, or microbes.
Pasteur published his first paper on the formation of lactic acid and its function in souring milk in 1857. Further studies developed the valuable technique of pasteurization (see Dairy Industry). The same year he was appointed manager and director of scientific studies at his old school, the �cole Normale Sup�rieure. During the next several years he extended his studies into the germ theory. He spent much time proving to doubting scientists that germs do not originate spontaneously in matter but enter from the outside....
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