Character Catalog

By demonstrating that fermentations are caused by living microorganisms rather than purely spontaneous chemical processes, Pasteur laid the foundations of microbiology and modern medicine.

Pasteur definitively proved that a sterile liquid does not spontaneously spoil if the air entering it is filtered, putting an end to a scientific controversy several centuries old.

A moderate heating technique used to destroy pathogenic microorganisms in wine, beer, and milk. This method revolutionized food preservation and is still universally used today.

By discovering that an aged and weakened culture of the cholera bacillus immunized chickens against the disease, Pasteur generalized Jenner's principle of vaccination and opened the way for modern vaccinology.

Developed and publicly tested at Pouilly-le-Fort, this vaccine saved millions of livestock animals and spectacularly demonstrated the validity of the principle of vaccination using attenuated agents.

The first successful application of a rabies vaccine on a human, administered to Joseph Meister. This landmark discovery, celebrated worldwide, brought Pasteur international renown and led to the founding of the Institut Pasteur.

I have sought to demonstrate, through experiments I believe to be irrefutable, that spontaneous generation does not exist; that under present circumstances, inert matter never gives rise to life.

We have found that cultures of this microbe, after aging in air, lose their virulence while retaining their culture properties, and that animals inoculated with these attenuated cultures subsequently resist inoculation with virulent cultures.

Joseph Meister, aged 9, had been bitten on the hand, legs, and thighs in 14 places, so deeply that walking was difficult for him. The most serious bites were 60 hours old. The death of this child seemed inevitable; I resolved, not without acute and painful anxiety, to try on Joseph Meister the method that had consistently succeeded in dogs.

Heating wine to a temperature between 55 and 60 degrees Celsius destroys the ferments that cause its spoilage, without appreciably altering its taste qualities. This method constitutes a practical and effective means of preservation.

Birthplace of Louis Pasteur, born on December 27, 1822. His childhood home is now a museum retracing his early years and beginnings.

Pasteur completed his higher studies there, then taught and set up his first major laboratory. It is here that he conducted his decisive research on spontaneous generation.

Founded in 1888 through an international public subscription, this institute is the crowning achievement of Pasteur's career. He spent his final years there and is buried in a magnificent crypt.

Village where Pasteur carried out his famous public vaccination experiment against anthrax on sheep in 1881, before the eyes of the press and the international scientific community.

Town where Pasteur grew up and to which he returned every summer to recharge. He owned a house there that is now a museum, and it is where he suffered his first stroke in 1868.

A glass flask with a long curved neck designed by Pasteur to demonstrate that it is the dust in the air, not the air itself, that causes putrefaction. These sealed flasks still contain sterile broths preserved to this day at the Institut Pasteur.

A central tool in Pasteur's laboratory, it allowed him to observe yeasts, bacteria, and parasites. It was through the microscope that he identified the corpuscles responsible for silkworm diseases.

An instrument used to vaccinate animals and patients, which became a symbol of Pasteurian preventive medicine. The syringe used to treat Joseph Meister against rabies is preserved as a scientific relic.

A device for bringing liquids to a controlled temperature, essential to the development of pasteurization for milk, wine, and beer. It also allowed microbes to be attenuated in order to create vaccines.

Pasteur kept very detailed handwritten notebooks of all his experiments. His notebooks, held at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, reveal the rigor and method of his scientific work.

Pasteur studied alcoholic fermentation at the request of brewers and winemakers. Analysis of these liquids allowed him to demonstrate that fermentation is the result of the activity of living microorganisms.