(The discovery of penicillin) was a triumph of accident, a fortunate occurrence which happened while I was working … - Alexander Fleming

Same topic Authors

Quote of the day

Tell people that war is an evil, and they will laugh; for who does not know it? Tell them that patriotism is an evil, and most of them will agree, but with a reservation. "Yes," they will say, "wrong patriotism is an evil; but there is another kind, the kind we hold. " But just what this good patriotism is, no one explains.

Alexander Fleming

(The discovery of penicillin) was a triumph of accident, a fortunate occurrence which happened while I was working on a purely academic bacteriological problem.

Academic, Discovery, Problem, Triumph, Working

Same Author Quotes

One sometimes finds what one is not looking for. When I woke up just after dawn on Sept. 28, 1928, I certainly didn’t plan to revolutionize all medicine by discovering the world’s first antibiotic, or bacteria killer. But I guess that was exactly what I did.

Dawn, Exactly, Finds, Medicine, Sept, World

It is not difficult to make microbes resistant to penicillin in the laboratory by exposing them to concentrations not sufficient to kill them, and the same thing has occasionally happened in the body. The time may come when penicillin can be bought by anyone in the shops. Then there is the danger that the ignorant man may easily underdose himself and by exposing his microbes to non-lethal quantities of the drug make them resistant.

Body, Drug, Ignorant, Laboratory, Men, Resistant

The unprepared mind cannot see the outstretched hand of opportunity.

Hand, Hands, Mind, Opportunity, Unprepared

For the birth of something new, there has to be a happening. Newton saw an apple fall; James Watt watched a kettle boil; Roentgen fogged some photographic plates. And these people knew enough to translate ordinary happenings into something new.

Birth, Fall, Fog, Fogged, Science, Translate

Penicillin cures, but wine makes people happy.

Penicillin, People, Vineyards, Wine