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Sir Alexander Fleming
Life Details
Born: August 6th 1881. Died: March 11th 1955.
Introduction
Sir Alexander Fleming was a Scottish scientist who discovered and named Penicillin, the base ingredient of a line of drugs known as antibiotics.
Early Life
Born in August 1881, Alexander Fleming was raised in Lochfield, near Darvel in Ayrshire, Scotland. Born into a farming family, his father was fragile, and later died when he was just 7 years old. His early academic life was at a tiny, single-roomed school with 12 pupils. He then moved to Darvel School, which was an 8 mile round trip on foot. At the age of 11, his academic potential was realised, and he was given a scholarship at Kilmarnock Academy, which he boarded for two years before moving to London.
He moved to London when he was 13, in 1895. He lived with his older brother, Tom, who was a doctor of medicine. Fleming attended the Polytechnic School, and he ended up learning two years ahead of his age, as it was soon discovered that he was not challenged enough.
Medical School and Work
Fleming became interested in the bacterial action of blood and in antiseptics. Although he served throughout World War I as a captain in the Army Medical Corps, he was able to continue his studies. He started to work on antibacterial substances which would not be toxic to animal tissues. In 1921, he discovered Lysozome, a bacteriolytic substance. He worked on blood titration, which is the process of adding a solution to another to make it react under conditions in which the added volume may be accurately measured.
He used this titration method to find penicillin. In 1928, he was working on the influenza virus when he observed that mould had developed on a culture plate. He noticed that the mould had created a bacteria-free cirle around itself. He experimented further and found that a mould culture prevented growth of staphylococci, even when diluted 800 times. This active substance was then named Penicillin.
Personal Life
Fleming married twice:
Sarah McElroy: in 1915, Fleming married her and had a son. She died in 1949.
Dr. Amalia Koutsouri-Voureka: she was a Greek colleague, whom he married in 1953.
Unfortunately, Fleming died in 1955, just two years after marrying for the second time. He is survived by his son, a general medical practitioner.
