Alexander Fleming was born in 1881 in Ayrshire, Scotland, to a farming family of four children. He attended Louden Moor School, Darvel School and Kilmarnock Academy before moving to London in 1895, where he lived with his brother. In London, Alexander Fleming completed his basic education at Regent Street Polytechnic (now the University of Westminster). (Photo: Wikipedia)
Alexander Fleming entered the medical field in 1901, studying at St. Mary's Hospital Medical School (University of London). While at St. Mary's, he won a gold medal in 1908 as the top medical student. (Photo: britannica)
Fleming initially aimed to become a surgeon, but while working in the Vaccination Department at St. Mary’s Hospital, he turned to the new field of bacteriology. There, he developed his research skills under the guidance of bacteriologist and immunologist Sir Almroth Edward Wright, whose revolutionary ideas on vaccine therapy represented a completely new direction in medical treatment. (Photo: Getty)
During World War I, Fleming served in the Royal Army Medical Corps. He was responsible for studying wound infections in a laboratory in France. He was the first doctor to suggest that wounds should be kept dry and clean to heal more effectively. However, his recommendations were not heeded at the time. (Photo: Getty)
In 1928, Fleming returned to the laboratory to continue studying the culture environment of Staphylococcus aureus (scientific name is Staphylococcus aureus, a highly toxic staphylococcus bacteria). He discovered that the staphylococcus aureus bacteria surrounding this mold were completely destroyed. (Photo: britannica)
He initially called the substance “mold juice,” then named it “penicillin,” after the mold that produced it. Thinking he had found an enzyme more powerful than lysozyme, Fleming decided to investigate further. However, what he discovered was not an enzyme but an antibiotic, which was one of the first antibiotics ever discovered. (Photo: listennotes)
Fleming recruited two young researchers to work together to show that penicillin had clinical potential, both in topical and injectable forms if it could be properly developed. (Photo: radicalteatowel)
Soon after Fleming’s discovery, a team of scientists from Oxford University – led by Howard Florey and his colleague Ernst Chain – successfully isolated and purified penicillin. The antibiotic was eventually used in World War II, revolutionizing the field of infection control on the battlefield. (Photo: britannica)
Florey, Chain, and Fleming shared the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, but their relationship soured over who should receive the most credit for developing penicillin. In 1946, Fleming was appointed head of St. Mary's Vaccination Department, president of the Society for General Microbiology, a fellow of the Royal Academy of Sciences, and honorary member of most of the world's medical and scientific societies. (Photo: meisterdrucke)
Outside the scientific community, Fleming was appointed chancellor of the University of Edinburgh from 1951 to 1954. He was also awarded honorary doctorates from nearly 30 universities in Europe and the United States. Fleming died of a heart attack on March 11, 1955, at his home in London, England. (Photo: reddit)
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