Discovery of the vaccinations

Edward Jenner Have you had smallpox? Polio? Typhoid? Prob a bly not. However, such infectious diseases used to plague humankind The word plague comes from one of these killer diseases the bubonic plague. Throughout the four teenth and fifteenth centuries, the plague killed nearly half of the pop u la tion of Europe. Smallpox killed over 100,000 people a year...

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Discovering the Oxygen

Joseph Priestley Priestley’s discovery of oxygen sparked a chemical revolution. He was the first person to isolate a single gaseous element in the mix ture of gas ses we call “air.” Before Priestley’s dis cov ery, sci en tific study had focused on metals. By dis cov er ing that air wasn't a uniform thing, Priestley created a new interest in the study of gasses and air. Because oxygen is...

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Discovering of the Bacteria

Antonie van Leeuwenhoek (1673) Just as Galileo used his telescope to open the hu man ho ri zon to the planets and stars of space, so van Leeuwenhoek used his microscope to open human awareness to the microscopic world that was invisibly small and that no one had even dreamed existed He dis covered protozoa bacteria, blood cells, sperm, and capillary s His work founded...

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Discovering human circulatory system

William Harvey The human circulatory system represents the virtual definition of life. No system is more critical to our ex is tence. Yet only 400 years ago, no one understood our cir cu la tory system  Many se ri ously thought that the thumping inside the chest was the voice of the conscience trying to...

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Discovering human anatomy

Andreas Vesalius The human anatomy ref er ences used by doctors through the year A.D. 1500 were actually based mostly on animal studies, more myth and error than truth. Andreas Vesalius was the first to insist on dissec tions, on exact phys i o log i cal ex per i ment and direct b...

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