What Was The First Antibiotic?

What was the first antibiotic discovered? While Alexander Fleming’s discovery of penicillin gets the most hype (and a Nobel Prize) there’s evidence that humans throughout ancient history fought infections with remedies like mold, honey, beer, and some interesting home recipes. Then in the 19th century, Emmerich and Low came up with pyocyanase, what has the best claim to the title of first antibiotic. And then by the early 20th century, the duo of Paul Ehrlich and Sahachiro Hata discovered the anti-syphilitic effects of Salvarsan. And while it didn’t count as an antibiotic, it became the inspiration for an entirely new class of drugs.

☠️NONE OF THE INFORMATION IN THIS VIDEO SHOULD BE USED AS MEDICAL ADVICE OR OPINION. IT IS FOR GENERAL EDUCATION AND ENTERTAINMENT☠️

🔗 L I N K S 🔗

🔑 P A T R O N S 🔑
Ron Blumenfeld
Joanne K
Sal F.
Ansel K
Anton
Brandon K
Rourou Y
Brendan P
Dane M
Kristoffer R
Jakub V
Joe B
Karly N
Mindi F
Kathy K

📜 S O U R C E S 📜

What are bacteria and antibiotics

Staining and Dyes

Ehrlich and Salvarsan

💻 C O N T A C T 💻
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⌛T I M E S T A M P S ⌛
0:00 Intro
0:25 What is bacteria?
3:10 Ancientbiotics
8:34 Dyes
12:57 Gram Stain Procedure
15:00 Paul Ehrlich and Salvarsan

Correction: 7:56 Semmelweiss also used chlorinated lime antiseptic
#historyofmedicine #medicalhistory

[PatKellyTeaches]

As always, I couldn't make these videos without my supporters on Patreon. If you get value from my videos, consider signing on as a Patron at www.patreon.com/corporis

[blunderchips]

I keep forgetting this channel has less than 10k subs, should be a hell of a lot more. love the content btw <3

[kerryevans]

I was taught A level biology by Alexander Fleming's granddaughter. Awesome teacher.
After 45 years of no problems, I'm now allergic to penicillin.

[samsalamander]

My Uncle in his 90s had blood poisoning when he was around 5, he was bitten by a dirty South Boston Crab and he told me he watched a line form that went from the cut on his foot up his leg, he didn’t remember how he got home or how he got to the hospital. He also told me they had no penicillin and they were injecting him with a black fluid. He said he almost died. It surprised me that they didn’t use penicillin. It’s something we take for granted but many of us wouldn’t be alive today without the help of antibiotics.

[thomasborgsmidt]

Well, my dad was a pharmacist apprentice in the 1930'ies and he handed over Salvarsan to regulars from the navy - that had been in Danish colonies in their youth - and naturally caught syphilis - which in practice meant that they for the rest of their days had to take antibiotics (Salversan). The problem was:
a) The side effects of Salversan was no joke.
b) Salvarsan had a notoriusly low toxic index - meaning that the differnce between effective terapeutic dose and toxic dose was low - just about a factor of 10. The contrast to penicillin is staggering. The point being that with increasing bacterial resistance to penicillin - the remidy is simple: Ooumph up the dose - penicillin is incredibly non-toxic.
It has allway been a mystery to me, that sulphonamides have not stayed on the repertoire: Simply because the working mechanism of sulphonamides and penicillin is so totally different. The point being: A combination treatment gives the bacteria not one, but two problems which they have to evolve away from simultaneously.

It also shows that "difficult" diseases from mycobateria like tuberculosis and Hansens diseasy do need a combination terapy with more than one weapon. Same thing for HIV (though it is not a bacteria).

How incredibly effective penicillin is shown by the temperature raise at the start of treatment - the bacteria are blown up by the aminoacids having a chiral - which creates a weak point the cellular wall of the bacteria - which is like a nail in car tyre. As soon as the pressure goes up the organism explodes and its enzymes float around - and as enzymes are VERY temperature specific in their working the immunesystem ups the temperature - known colloqualy as fever.

[martinpollard]

Microbiology was hard work in med school and you needed to be well caffeinated for the lectures, this is just great, well presented, historically accurate and entertaining. Excellent work.

[mariekatherine]

Ah, yes! An evening with Venus, a lifetime with Mercury!

[gustavgnoettgen]

I had an unfortunate episode in my life, long story short my fridge was a mess.

Anyway, I could witness how Camembert mould on half a cantaloupe would prohibit any other mould nearby. That was kind of cool.

[AndrewGillard]

12:03 “Aspirin 5 grs.each” scared me for a second, thinking those tablets were _5 grams_ each! That would be more than 16× the strength of modern 300 mg tablets here in the UK, and 5.5× the maximum recommended dose (900 mg). _Per tablet._ Yikes! 😮

… But then I remembered that drugs used to be measured in _grains_ 😅 So those tablets are only 8% stronger than those I buy today — assuming my calculator's “1 grain = 64.79891 mg” is accurate and definitions haven't been changed in the intervening decades. That makes 5 grains = 324 mg.
… and that probably explains why the aspirin tablets my housemate brought back from the USA were 325 mg instead of 300 mg.
What a fun rabbit hole that single image sent me down! 😹

And yes, great work as always!

[frankpape]

Methylene blue mentioned around 15:25 is a dye which i use at my work in a brewery regularly to check for yeast viability (a.k.a. see how much of the yeast is still alive (dead yeast=blue)).. from what i know methylene blue still has some medical aplications to this day.. Treating methemoglobinemia.. which is a misfolding of hemoglobine in blood causes the skin to appear blue and debilitating the oxygen transport... always found it funny that theyre fighting blue with more blue.... also methyleneblue is an antidote to cyanide posioning.. but people tend to die rather quickly from that. I dont think it gets used much for this last purpose... alright, enough trivia

[TheAlchaemist]

A little note. Semmelweiz didn't just use soap, they washed their hands with a kind of bleach knowing that more than simple mechanical removal was needed.

[Jadinass]

I love love love that you went so deep on the dye innovation that was happening. Staining is such an important and ubiquitous part for any kind of microscopy and has only grown more sophisticated over time that by now with a great number of methods we can design system that very specifically delivers a dye to any part of the cell that we want and thus confirm the presence and precise location of a target. The general public might not know this but cells really aren't that colorful. Even a very vibrant orange carrot only has a very tiny amount of orange carotenoid in each cell that is mostly clear.

[jan-willemvandijk]

Soap doesn't kill bacteria? Detergents go to town on membranes as far as I know, leading to the collapse of the cell. I'm really confused on why half the links on google just say it washes off cells (even a Harvard link). I work with bacteria and if soap would just allow them to not stick to plastics and glasswear it would be great.

[nikevisor]

It's so much fun to trace the links across all of your content. I'm starting to understand why medical history can be so much fun to research :)

[michaelogden]

I think the association between dyes and pharmaceuticals is fascinating.

[softwarerevolutions]

With Jenner, Pasteur, and Fleming as my heroes, this channel is golden. I studied biology in school only but, this topic comes off to me as a culmination and the highest goal of both chemistry and biology. Indeed it takes a lot of creativity which is why I love it even though I am from the engineering background with a touch of design.

[jimhewettjr]

YouTube just showed me your videos/channel a few days ago, and I'm thoroughly enjoying your content. Extremely interesting. I'll have to watch more as time allows.
Keep up the great work.

[joseotaviocarvalhosenadeal]

Great video, Patrick! I love your work on the history of medicine and I'm anxious to see your development! As a pharmacist that graduated recently I must say that the context that you give was missed during my time studying(haha)!

[mariahgronbach]

I just watched all of your videos in one go. So much information, but so very interesting! Thank you so much for all of your research and knowledge. Keep up the great work!❤

[Conex]

This is the most underrated channel I came across in a long time 👏