9. Dr. Alber

I found Dr. Alber’s presentation very interesting, especially being so close to watching to movie about him. It was interesting to hear some of the things discussed in the movie be presented in a classroom setting, as it really gave a sense of the class coming in a sort of circle. I have been very interested in vaccination and disease in the past couple years, and this presentation got me even more intrigued. Even with this, I would say my favorite part of the presentation was the discussion about Pasteur’s more personal life, such as his homemade laboratory and his germophobic tendencies with his tiny bed. Overall, I was very interested in everything Dr. Alber discussed and thought it tied into the class very well.

I was disappointed I was not able to attend Dr. Alber’s lecture on Pasteur. I was looking forward to it after seeing the movie on Pasteur the previous day. I found the movie intriguing as it gave character to Pasteur and still gave the facts about his work with germ theory and vaccines. The most interesting part of the movie for me was when they did the experiment with the sheep between those that were vaccinated and those that were not. I think I found the topic so interesting because there are still many people today that refuse to vaccinate based on various reasons. I think the experiment, although found in the movie, still has relevant topics in today’s world and could benefit anyone willing to watch the film.

Because I was unable to attend the lecture portion, I read the article Pasteur and the art of chirality. I am still confused as to what chirality is but gained a deeper understanding of the topic ad how it relates to Pasteur. Chirality was one of Pasteur’s first discoveries as a young recent PhD graduate. He noticed how two different substances had similar molecules, but where mirror reflections of each other, thus leading to different characteristics. The article explains how Pasteur’s predecessors had missed this and what may have contributed to his discovery. One of the contributions mentioned is simply that he picked two substances that could be compared in the right way. Another influence was that of Sir John Frederick William Herschel who believed their was asymmetry in the universe. Finally, the paper discussed how Pasteur’s artistic abilities and his sense of realism in art contributed in his ability to notice the mirror images in the crystals. I found it interesting to learn about Pasteur’s other discoveries as well as his other hobbies that helped him achieve his discoveries.

I found Dr. Alber’s presentation on Louis Pasteur very interesting. I enjoyed watching the movie and liked that she was able to join us then tie it into her presentation. I found it interesting how Pasteur was able to give the vaccination to the people after they were already infected. I was always under the impression that vaccines were only useful if received 2-4 weeks before exposure, however as Dr. Alber explained, that wasn’t the case.  The disease didn’t impact the body until 5 days, and the vaccine still worked because it was injected before the 5 days. I wonder if this is always the case or if it was only effective on rabies?

I enjoyed Dr.Kinghorn’s lecture as I have barely any knowledge about botany or its uses in medicine. As a result, I was surprised to learn facts like how 3/4 or the population relies on plants for medicine. This statistic illuminates how important nature really is for human survival, as medicine is another vital role plants have play in human survival. It was also really interesting to learn how without any advance knowledge of chemistry, ancient people figured out how to use plants for medicine, with 122 plants still being used today for medicine. It was also very interesting to learn how people have managed to exploit poisonous plants in a way that can be beneficial to humans. One interesting example was the Calabar bean. In the past, people used it as a “truth” drug in the sense if the perpetrator died from ingesting the bean, they were then guilty. Other times when the person survived, they were regarded as innocent or telling the truth. The real reason for this effect was that if the bean was broken, its poison would be absorbed and the person would perish almost immediately where if the bean was swallowed whole, the person would survive. Later, it was found that the poison in this bean was found to have a use in treating glaucoma. It is really fascinating to see how something so poisonous could be turned around so as to become an advantage instead of a disadvantage.

I very much enjoy the type of discussion where we watch a movie and the next lecturer fills in the blanks and corrects some mistakes. The movie, “The story of Louis Pasteur”, held up very well for its time. Apart from the grainy texture, this movie still conveyed an effective story 80ish years later. I enjoy seeing famous people have emotion through movies and such. Even if these depictions are not always accurate, it reminds us that these historical figures were people too. It was very helpful as Dr. Alber went through and corrected mistakes that were made in the movie or showing details that weren’t mentioned because they didn’t fit into the story. With Alber’s presentation, seeing the laboratory that Pasteur built in his home was very intriguing. He added fume hoods and gas lines into a regular home in the country side. The biggest point that stuck with me from the presentation was Alber mentioning how beautiful the lab was. It truly is. I am used to working in labs in the basement of a building with white tile and white walls. Seeing the wood and the sunlight I could not comprehend that that was a lab that someone could work in.

Dr. Alber’s presentation on Louis Pasteur was great. I enjoyed how she talked about the movie that we watched in class. I have studied some microbiology and have learned a little about Pastuer as well as his accomplishments. He was known for studying microorganisms and how they lived. He found out that microorganisms were all around us and the diseases they cause can be traced back to microbes and can often be stopped. It was interesting to look at a timeline of Pasteur’s life and see how his early work was applied by Lister to introduce sterilization in surgery. Pasteur contributed greatly to advancing society to where it is today. In his time he could never have believed that today we would have antibiotic resistant bacteria and other things of the sort to deal with. Dr. Alber was very intriguing and informational.

I really enjoyed Dr. Alber’s presentation on Louis Pasteur. She gave us a lot of information on his work, and described his laboratories very well with the help of pictures. I also liked how Dr. Alber even described his rival, Robert Koch, and what he has done for science as well. I liked how Dr. Alber went into further detail than what was shown in the movie, which helped give us a deeper understanding of what Pasteur did and how he lived.  One thing that I found very interesting was how Pasteur was basically the worlds first germophobe, since he used separate doors in his bathroom to get into bed. I guess you couldn’t blame him though, since he firmly believed that germs were the cause of all disease, and since he did end up to live a fairly long time for his time period.

This discussion was very interesting and something that I learned a lot from. Being a science major the name Pasteur is well known to me as a science icon. However I really had no idea how long his list of accomplishments is as before I had really only known of him to be the creator of the swan neck flask and a driving force it practicing sterilization to maintain more accurate and better treatments in the health care system. It was also interesting to hear that while accomplishing all this amazing scientific research he was also going through very rough personal issues of his homeland being invaded by other countries and his personal and familial health struggles. I found it very interesting that he could some what be defined as a function germaphobe I wonder if this is due to all his studies on germs and diseases or the health implications that he and his family were suffering. His laboratory in his parents house is absolutely beautiful and it shows not only is ability as scientist but was kind of a man of many trades as he was able to do the instillation and building of an entire laboratory. I can not wait to learn more about him and see some of his work while on our trip.

I liked learning about Louis Pasteur from Dr.Alber’s talk as I did enjoy some details that she pointed out that I had not known before. One such detail includes how Louis Pasteur’s laboratory looked like. From the labs I have seen, it is such a stark contrast. I personally love nature and love to be outside whenever I can. Because of this, I always love to be in buildings that have lots of windows for natural light as not only do I find it relaxing, but also a good way keep me motivated when doing work. Having such a wide open and naturally well lit laboratory seems like something that would have inspired him to continue working on experiments without getting too fatigued with the process. This was quite important due to the nature of his experiments. I didn’t realize how much work his experiments took, as I didn’t understand that you have to basically create everything from the glass holding containers to the chemicals themselves. Without modern luxuries such as having equipment and supplies readily available, it is even more impressive the lengths he took to not only to create and test experiments, but to further continue so as to find solutions to the problematic discoveries he had made.