RARE Autograph and Book Auction October 17th
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 10/17/2024
Louis Pasteur, Rare autographed note related to working on Rabies vaccine: "If, by accident, a rabbit or a dog should die before my arrival, preserve the dead body on ice. Good health to you and yours. L. Pasteur". It is framed with an engraving of Pasteur. The note paper has some discoloration and normal age.
Between the years 1877-1887 Louis Pasteur was working on curing rabies in rabbits, cats and dogs. He had the idea of inoculating part of a rabid dog’s brain directly into another dog’s brain. The inoculated dog subsequently died. The experiment was then conducted on rabbits as the risk for the experimentalists was less than with rabid dogs. After serial passage through several rabbits, the rabies incubation period was still six days. He had therefore produced a vaccine with stable virulence. Louis Pasteur then attempted to develop a vaccine with attenuated virulence. He suspended sections of spinal cord from rabid rabbits inside flasks to dry in a moisture-free atmosphere. Virulence gradually declined until finally disappearing. Louis Pasteur injected these spinal cord sections into rabid dogs, followed by preparations of increasing virulence. They did not develop rabies. He then established a protocol to fight the disease effectively. On February 25, 1884, together with Charles Chamberland and Emile Roux, Louis Pasteur announced the discovery to the French Academy of Science which appointed a study commission to assess the method’s efficacy. The method was deemed conclusive and approved.
Louis Pasteur (27 December 1822 – 28 September 1895) was a French chemist, pharmacist, and microbiologist renowned for his discoveries of the principles of vaccination, microbial fermentation, and pasteurization, the last of which was named after him. His research in chemistry led to remarkable breakthroughs in the understanding of the causes and prevention of diseases, which laid down the foundations of hygiene, public health and much of modern medicine. Pasteur's works are credited with saving millions of lives through the developments of vaccines for rabies and anthrax. He is regarded as one of the founders of modern bacteriology and has been honored as the "father of bacteriology" and the "father of microbiology".
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Louis Pasteur, Autographed Note related to his experiments on rabies, on rabbits and dogs!
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