Moving from microbe hunters to microbe managers
In 1676, the great Dutch naturalist Antonie van Leeuwenhoek first observed bacteria in a drop of water. Almost two centuries later Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch recognized bacteria as a cause of disease, leading to development of germ theory, and applied by Joseph Lister in antiseptic surgery. These and other great discoveries establish microbiology as one of the triumphs of human knowledge. Now, Dr. Brett Finlay, Peter Wall Distinguished Professor at the Michael Smith Laboratories at the University of British Columbia, has offered profound research into the mechanisms of microbes at the molecular level, which has revealed their positive contributions to human wellness in addition to their role in infectious disease.