Louis Pasteur entered the École Normale Supérieure in 1843 and received his Master of Science degree in 1845 and then acquired an advanced degree in physical sciences. He later earned his doctorate in sciences in 1847.
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
Regina-Pacis-Weg 3, 53113 Bonn, Germany
In 1868, Louis Pasteur earned his honorary Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Bonn.
Career
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
1880
45 rue d’Ulm, F-75230 Paris, France
French chemist Dr. Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895), the father of modern bacteriology, pursues his studies in his laboratory at the Ecole Normale in Paris. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
French scientist Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895), "father of modern bacteriology." Original Artwork: By Paul Rochas & Bannel. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
1880
Louis Pasteur in his laboratory, surrounded by cages of rabbits on which he experimented in an attempt to find a cure for rabies. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
1884
Louis Pasteur ( 1822-1895 ), chemist and French biologist, in 1884. (Photo by Roger Viollet Collection)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
1889
Louis Pasteur (1822-1895), French chemist and biologist at work in his laboratory c. 1889. (Photo by Universal History Archive)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
1889
Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) french chemist and biologist, he found a vaccine against rabies in 1885. (Photo by Apic)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
1895
Louis Pasteur - French chemist. Caption reads "Centenaire de Pasteur."(Photo by Culture Club)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
French chemist and bacteriologist Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895) working in his laboratory in Paris. Original Publication: People Disc - HN0500. (Photo by Rischgitz)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
French chemist Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895) experimenting on a chloroformed rabbit in an investigation into hydrophobia. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
Doctor Louis Pasteur posing with four children who had been bitten by mad dogs and treated by him with his new rabies vaccine. (Photo by March Of Time/March Of Time/The LIFE Picture Collection)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
Portrait of French chemist Louis Pasteur from English periodical VANITY FAIR. (Photo by Time Life Pictures/Mansell/The LIFE Picture Collection)
Gallery of Louis Pasteur
Portrait of Louis Pasteur (1822-1895). Private Collection. (Photo by Fine Art Images/Heritage Images)
Achievements
Membership
The Royal Society
1869
The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
French chemist Dr. Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895), the father of modern bacteriology, pursues his studies in his laboratory at the Ecole Normale in Paris. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
Louis Pasteur in his laboratory, surrounded by cages of rabbits on which he experimented in an attempt to find a cure for rabies. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
Louis Pasteur entered the École Normale Supérieure in 1843 and received his Master of Science degree in 1845 and then acquired an advanced degree in physical sciences. He later earned his doctorate in sciences in 1847.
French chemist and bacteriologist Louis Pasteur (1822 - 1895) working in his laboratory in Paris. Original Publication: People Disc - HN0500. (Photo by Rischgitz)
A portrait of Dr. Louis Pasteur, French chemist and microbiologist and the founder of modern bacteriology. During his career he discovered various means of minimizing the virulence of bacteria in foods. His work triggered the development of vaccines. (Photo by Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS)
Doctor Louis Pasteur posing with four children who had been bitten by mad dogs and treated by him with his new rabies vaccine. (Photo by March Of Time/March Of Time/The LIFE Picture Collection)
Louis Pasteur was a French biologist, chemist, and scientist who discovered that microbes were responsible for souring alcohol and came up with the process of pasteurization, where bacteria is destroyed by heating beverages and then allowing them to cool. His work in germ theory also led him and his team to create vaccinations for anthrax and rabies.
Background
Louis Pasteur was born on December 27, 1822, in Dole, Jura, France, the third child of Jean-Joseph Pasteur and Jeanne-Etiennette Roqui. His father was a tanner and a sergeant major decorated with the Legion of Honor during the Napoleonic Wars.
When Louis was four years old his family moved to the nearby town of Arbois.
Education
Louis Pasteur started school aged eight at the École Primaire Arbois - it was actually a single room in the town hall. He could already read, having been taught by his father. His teachers rated his childhood academic ability as middling.
After completing his primary education, he joined the Collège Royal de Besançon in 1839. Pasteur earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1840 and Bachelor of Science degree in 1842.
He entered the École Normale Supérieure - a teachers' college in Paris - in 1843 and received his Master of Science degree in 1845 and then acquired an advanced degree in physical sciences. He later earned his doctorate in sciences in 1847.
In 1868, Louis Pasteur earned his honorary Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Bonn.
A chemistry professor at the École Normale by the name of Antoine Jérome Balard had liked what he’d seen of Pasteur. Balard was an eminent scientist, famed for his discovery of the element bromine in 1826. He offered Pasteur work as a chemistry graduate assistant along with the opportunity to carry out research for a doctorate. Balard also waged a successful campaign against the government education department, which was trying to force Pasteur to move to the teaching job in Tournon.
Aged just 25, Pasteur was appointed as professor of chemistry at the University of Strasbourg.
Pasteur made his first great discovery in 1848. For a number of years, scientists had been puzzled about organic chemicals such as tartaric acid. A large number of natural organic substances had been found to rotate the plane of polarized light to the left or right, while the apparently identical substances made in the laboratory did not.
Pasteur, who had made a study of polarized light for his physics thesis, discovered the solution to the puzzle. He showed that molecules could exist in mirror-image forms, as shown in the image below. This was an enormously significant discovery in the history of science, revealing an asymmetry at the very heart of the natural world: many of the molecules made in nature are either left- or right-handed. Pasteur's discovery paved the way for crucial breakthroughs in chemistry, biochemistry, and pharmaceuticals.
In 1854, aged 31, Pasteur left Strasbourg to become Dean of the Faculty of Sciences at Lille University - a very senior position for such a young scientist.
One of his students at Lille told him about a problem that was bothering his industrialist father. Emile Bigo-Danel's father owned a distillery in Lille that converted sugar beet to alcohol by fermentation. Sometimes the fermentation went wrong and produced low concentrations of alcohol. Sometimes the alcohol soured. Pasteur was fascinated by the problem and decided to investigate the phenomenon of fermentation.
At the time, the most commonly accepted explanation of fermentation was that it was a process caused by yeast - a single-celled microorganism - dying and decomposing. This was despite the fact that in 1836 Theodor Schwann had already shown that fermentation of sugar to alcohol required the action of living yeast. Schwann had been ridiculed for his work.
In 1858 and subsequent years, Pasteur published the results of the intensive research work he carried out in Lille, establishing that fermentation is a process involving the action of living yeast. Living yeast converts sugar into alcohol. He found that the action of a different yeast makes milk go sour, converting milk sugars to lactic acid. If this yeast contaminates a wine fermentation, the wine is soured by the production of lactic acid.
Pasteur wrote: "Alcoholic fermentation is an act correlated with the life and organization of the yeast cells, not with the death or putrefaction of the cells."
His work was conclusive. The scientific world now accepted that the action of living yeast was necessary for fermentation to take place.
Years later, in 1878, Pasteur wrote a personal letter to Schwann expressing his admiration, saying: "For twenty years past I have been traveling along some of the paths opened up by you."
In 1857, aged 34, Pasteur returned to the École Normale in Paris as Director of Scientific Studies. No laboratory was available for him and the government said there was no money to fund any research. Determined to continue with his work, Pasteur personally paid for the conversion of part of the École Normale’s attic space to a laboratory and funded his own research work there.
His faith in his ability to make more scientific breakthroughs was soon rewarded with the discovery of an entirely new type of living organism - anaerobic microbes - microbes that live without the need for air or the oxygen gas it contains.
After spending several years observing the beneficial and harmful effects of microbes on foodstuffs, in 1862 Pasteur invented the pasteurization process. During pasteurization, farm and brewery products such as milk, wine and beer are heated briefly to a temperature between 60 and 100°C, killing microorganisms that can cause them to go bad.
In 1860 the French Academy announced a prize of 2,500 Francs to anyone who provided convincing experimental proof for or against the spontaneous generation of life.
Pasteur was awarded the prize in 1862. He showed that no microbes ever grew in nutrient solutions that had been sterilized by heating, provided the air above the solutions was also sterilized. If unsterilized air was allowed into the space above the solutions, microbes began growing in the solutions. The microbes were present in the unheated air.
Pasteur's work in fermentation and spontaneous generation and his discovery that pasteurization could prevent foodstuffs going bad led him to the conclusion that diseases are caused by germs - microscopic organisms. Pasteur recommended using filtration, exposure to heat, or exposure to chemicals to remove germs.
Joseph Lister read Pasteur's work, and in 1867 he implemented antiseptic methods in surgery - sterilizing surgical instruments and cleaning wounds with carbolic acid. These innovations cut infections and deaths following operations dramatically.
Years later, at a gathering in Paris to celebrate Pasteur's seventieth birthday, Lister said to Pasteur: "As a matter of fact, there is no one living in the entire world to whom the medical sciences owe so much as they do to you... Thanks to you, surgery has undergone a complete revolution which has robbed it of its terrors and extended its efficacious powers almost without limit."
In 1863 Pasteur became professor of geology, physics, and chemistry at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts of Paris.
Soon he turned his attention to a problem that had very little to do with any of the subjects that he was a professor of. The French silkworm industry - indeed the entire European silkworm industry - was being destroyed by a disease nobody seemed to be able to stop. Government tax revenues had been devastated and areas once prosperous were beset by poverty and hunger.
Pasteur was not a biologist. He knew nothing about worms. He had never performed a dissection in his life. In 1865, however, he was implored to investigate the problem. He did not want to get involved, but after turning down repeated requests, he finally accepted the task. And having accepted it, he launched himself into it with enormous energy, working until his health broke from exhaustion. His wife, Marie, also launched herself into the work, growing the silkworms he needed for experiments and writing notes.
Finally, after several false dawns and mistakes, near the end of 1867, Pasteur discovered that the silkworm’s eggs were being attacked by parasitic microbes. He gave instructions to owners of farms telling them how to prevent the problem. Next season, he was almost reduced to tears when problems persisted. He realized then that there must be a second microbe at work, totally independent of the first one.
Pasteur conquered this microbe too, but at great personal cost - in 1868, aged 45 he suffered a stroke. In the same year the brilliance of his work was recognized by the University of Bonn, where he was made an honorary Doctor of Medicine. The Austrian Government awarded Pasteur the 5,000 Florins they had offered as a reward to anyone who could solve the silkworm problem.
The work he carried out on silkworm diseases left him eager, despite now suffering from health issues of his own, to apply the lessons he had learned to human health.
In 1869, Louis Pasteur was elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society. In 1873, he was elected a Member of the Academy of Medicine. In 1880, Pasteur became a Member of the Central Society of Veterinary Medicine. In 1883, he became a Foreign Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Pasteur discovered methods of protecting people against two deadly diseases - anthrax (demonstrated in 1881) and rabies (demonstrated in 1885). He devised ways of producing weakened forms of the anthrax and rabies microbes and used these to vaccinate people.
When injected into people, Pasteur's vaccines fired up their immune systems so potently that they were able to overcome the deadly forms of the diseases.
Pasteur's success in the case of anthrax left a bitter taste in the mouth of a medical rival, and was certainly not in the best traditions of science. Pasteur secretly used the method of Jean Joseph Henri Toussaint, a veterinarian, to prepare anthrax vaccine for a public demonstration, rather than his own patented method. Toussaint should be remembered as the discoverer or (at the very least) co-discoverer of the anthrax vaccine.
In 1887 Pasteur founded the institute that bears his name. The Pasteur Institute seeks to continue its founder's goals of studying microorganisms and treating and preventing diseases. Eight of its researchers have been awarded Nobel Prizes in medicine. Its researchers were the first to isolate the HIV virus and their discoveries have led to better treatments for deadly diseases such as diphtheria, influenza, plague, polio, tetanus, tuberculosis, and yellow fever.
Louis Pasteur continued to work at the Pasteur Institute until June 1895, when he retired because of his increasing illness. He died on September 28, 1895, after suffering multiple strokes.
During his life, Louis Pasteur was the recipient of many prizes and medals including Rumford Medal (1856), Grand Prize Medal of the Exposition Universelle (1867), and Copley Medal (1874). In 1853 Pasteur was made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour, promoted to Officer in 1863, to Commander in 1868, to Grand Officer in 1878, and made a Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor in 1881.
Pasteur had a strong religious and humanitarian spirit. He firmly believed in God, as the Creator of all living things. From his knowledge of the Gospels, he wanted to benefit mankind by having his ideas used to "heal the sick."
Pasteur's chief contribution to the "spiritualist doctrine" was his campaign against spontaneous generation, the religiophilosophical consequences of which he emphasized in an address at the Sorbonne in 1864 while fervently denying that these broader issues had influenced his actual research. To the extent that any question was truly scientific, he argued, neither spiritualism nor any other philosophical school had a place in it. The "experimental method" alone could arbitrate scientific disputes. And while limited hypotheses played an essential role in the experimental method, speculation on the ultimate origin and end of things was beyond the realm of science. Despite this public posture, Pasteur sometimes speculated on the origin of life and attempted to create it experimentally, as he finally confessed in 1883. And while the results of his work on fermentation, spontaneous generation, and disease may point toward a vitalistic rather than a mechanistic position, it would be misleading if not erroneous to label Pasteur a vitalist.
Politics
Virtually obsessed with science and its applications, Pasteur devoted little thought to political matters. His beliefs were basically visceral or instinctive. His close association with the Second Empire reflects his political instincts. Despite a youthful flirtation with republicanism during the Revolution of 1848, Pasteur was essentially conservative, not to say reactionary. He considered strong leadership, firm law enforcement, and the maintenance of domestic order more important than civil liberty or even democracy, which he distrusted lest it lead to national mediocrity or vulgar tyranny. Yearning for the past glory of France, which he traced to Napoleon, he believed that Louis Napoleon might somehow restore it.
From the coup d’état of 2 December 1851, by which Louis Napoleon dissolved the Constituent Assembly, Pasteur declared himself a “partisan” of the new leader. Partly through Dumas, whom Napoleon III named a senator, Pasteur developed personal relations with the imperial household, to which he sent copies of his works on fermentation and spontaneous generation. Especially after 1863, when Dumas presented him to Louis Napoleon, Pasteur openly sought to attract imperial interest to his research. He dedicated his book on wines (1866) to the emperor and his book on silkworm diseases (1870) to the empress, who had encouraged him during the difficult early stages of this work.
Louis Napoleon’s deposition in 1870 nullified an imperial decree of 27 July 1870 by which Pasteur would have been awarded a national pension and made a senator. In 1868 the emperor had promoted Pasteur to the commander of the Legion of Honor, and in 1865 had invited him to Compiegne, the most elegant imperial residence. During a week there Pasteur, in giddy letters to his wife, betrayed his awe of, and fascination with, imperial power, pomp, and wealth. No mere political opportunist, however, he continued to acknowledge his association with and indebtedness to the empress after the abdication - in the face of advice that it could be politically imprudent to do so.
However firm Pasteur’s loyalty to the Second Empire, his general patriotism was even stronger. In 1871, despite tempting offers from Milan and Pisa, Pasteur remained in France, partly because of his wife’s unwillingness to expatriate but especially because he felt it would be an act of desertion to leave his country in the wake of its crushing defeat by Prussia. That defeat and the excesses of the Prussian army so aroused Pasteur that he vowed to inscribe all of his remaining works with the words. Also in 1871, he returned in protest an honorary M.D. awarded in 1868 by the University of Bonn. In an exchange of letters with the dean of the faculty of medicine there, which he published as a brochure, Pasteur cried out in rage at the “barbarity” being visited upon his country by Prussia and its king. In another brochure of 1871, “Some Reflections on Science in France,” Pasteur emphasized the disparity between the state support of science in France and in Germany, and traced the defeat of France in the war to its excessive tolerance toward the “Prussian canker [chancre]“ and to its neglect of science during the preceding half-century.
During the war and, later, the Commune, Pasteur withdrew to the provinces and launched his studies on beer-his explicit object being to bring France into competition with the superior German breweries. In 1873, when he patented the process that resulted from these studies, Pasteur stipulated that beer made by his method should bear in France the name "Bieres de la revanche nationale" and abroad the name "Bieres francaises." Chauvinism undoubtedly played some part in his refusal to grant permission to translate his Études sur la biere into German and in his bitter and protracted controversy with Robert Koch in the 1880’s Even on the eve of his death, Pasteur’s memories of the war remained so strong that he declined the Prussian Ordre Pour le Merite.
In 1875 Pasteur was asked by friends in Arbois to run for the Senate. Saying that he had no right to a political opinion because he had never studied politics, he nonetheless consented to run as a conservative. Presenting himself as the candidate of science and patriotism, he rehearsed his published explanations for the fall of France in the Franco-Prussian War and made his central political pledge "never [to] enter into any combinations the goal of which is to upset the established order of things." Although Pasteur’s strong commitment to scientific professionalism probably struck some as elitist, the main issues against him were his conservatism, his links with the Second Empire, and his suspected Bonapartist loyalties. In response, Pasteur reported that the emperor had died owing him 4,000 francs and disclaimed any link with organized Bonapartist groups. He was soundly defeated, receiving only 62 votes, nearly 400 less than each of the two successful candidates (both Republicans). Although asked at least twice during the 1880s to run again for the Senate, Pasteur declined while his strength for scientific work remained.
Views
In 1861, Pasteur published a refutation of spontaneous generation that was a masterpiece of experimental science and logic. First, he demonstrated that air is alive with microorganisms. This was done by filtering air through a cotton plug, trapping microorganisms, and examining them under a microscope. Many of these trapped organisms looked identical to those that had previously been observed by others in many infusions. Infusions are liquids containing nutrients in which microorganisms can proliferate. Pasteur showed that if the cotton plug was then dropped into a sterilized infusion, it became cloudy because the organisms quickly multiplied. Most notably, Pasteur’s experiment demonstrated that sterile infusions would remain sterile in specially constructed swan-necked flasks even when they were left open to the air. Gravity caused the airborne organisms to settle in the bends and sides of these unique flasks. The fluid in the flask remained sterile. Only when the flasks were tipped could bacteria enter the broth and grow, as evidenced by forming a cloudy solution. These simple and elegant experiments finally ended the arguments that unheated air or the infusions themselves contained a "vital force" necessary for spontaneous generation.
It has always been known that Louis Pasteur opposed the doctrine of spontaneous generation, and he presented compelling empirical evidence against it. He believed that the idea of spontaneous generation did not fit with the view of God as the Creator of life.
Pasteur conducted milk and butter experiments - showing microbes as being the source of spoilage, not spontaneous generation. On March 11, 1857, Pasteur initiated his experiments on milk spoilage, called lactic fermentation. He took careful notes day after day. Pasteur observed the appearance of some well-characterized lactic ferment. "Milk diseases," he concluded, were caused by bacteria. Pasteur's brilliant germ theory has withstood the test of time. Essentially this theory exposed microorganisms as the source of infectious diseases. Using his chemistry background, Pasteur postulated that the milk souring was caused by microbes which convert milk sugar into lactic acid. Today, it is known that this change is caused by streptococci and lactobacilli, bacteria that are used in the dairy industry to produce yogurt.
Pasteur hypothesized that microbes in fermentation perhaps had a parallel mechanism with regard to infectious disease. The expression "diseases of wine" was first used in 1857 to designate the souring of fermented grape juice by microbes. From 1867 to 1870, Pasteur studied two important silkworm diseases and identified the responsible agents as protozoa and bacteria. He provided a brilliant scheme describing each of these cause and effect relationships. By 1877, the germ theory of disease was so firmly established that even Pasteur’s critics could not counter the evidence.
Pasteur not only refuted the strange idea that one can get something from nothing, but he maintained life must come from other life or the Author of Life. This soon led to an understanding of both disease prevention (via aseptic techniques) and the germ theory of disease. He clearly demonstrated that infectious disease does not spontaneously appear as “miasmas” (a poisonous gas formerly thought to arise from swamps and cause disease) but was the outcome of disease-causing germs. The idea of biogenesis was antecedent to the concepts of both asepsis and the germ theory of disease. Because creation thinking embraces truth, real science, and God’s blessing, it frequently leads to life-saving practical applications, especially in the world of medicine. Pasteur was the first to successfully explain the genesis of germs and their implications.
A foundation in biology is the germ theory of disease. Although some may argue that this theory has its origin with Girolamo Fracastoro in 1546, the name most closely associated with the idea that germs cause disease is Louis Pasteur. It was Pasteur who developed his ideas of fermentation and experiments on milk and wine spoilage indicating disease by microorganisms. Prior to Pasteur, the connection between microorganisms and disease was not apparent since many microbes were known to be beneficial for humans (yeasts added to bread, or starter cultures for yogurt and cheese) and evidently did not cause disease.
In Europe during the 1800s, anthrax ravaged livestock, especially sheep. In some fields of France more than 10% of the sheep were dying. Robert Koch and Louis Pasteur had both reached the conclusion its cause was the bacterium Bacillus anthracis. Since sheep were vital to France's economy, anthrax was devastating thousands of herds. In 1878, Louis Pasteur was summoned by concerned stock handlers to possibly produce a vaccine against anthrax. It was an uphill battle; many doubted and were skeptical of this strange science called vaccination. Ever the humanitarian Pasteur went to work, and after several weeks of vaccination, the sheep with vaccination survived and those without the vaccine died. Once again, Pasteur’s tireless work paid off. His vaccine not only saved millions of animals, but also led to a human vaccine as well.
During Pasteur’s initial anthrax investigation a wager had been made at Pouilly-le-Fort over whether the vaccine would work. Most veterinarians, French scientists, and doctors had still not embraced the germ theory of disease. They believed anthrax was somehow caused by an imbalance in the sheep’s body, or some deleterious chemical. A public wager was announced. But soon it was obvious that Pasteur had gained another victory, further substantiating the germ theory.
Pasteur understood the variability of microbes and how he could apply this principle in vaccine preparation. He applied this concept to vaccinate dozens of sheep that would have otherwise died at a critical time in France. His understanding of this natural variation was also successfully applied in developing vaccines for chicken cholera and rabies.
In the case of the anthrax bacterium (Bacillus anthracis), it was heated to a temperature of 43 ºC. This destroyed the plasmid-encoding toxin gene but kept the bacterium alive. In fact, it loses information - in this case the pathogenicity gene (that Pasteur was unaware of). This weakened bacterium was injected by Pasteur into sheep to generate enormous antibody production against pathogenic B. anthracis (the real germ) when it would later be encountered. Clearly, Pasteur understood the basic dynamics of virulence, even though he did not know about antibody production.
Quotations:
"Did you ever observe to whom the accidents happen? Chance favors only the prepared mind."
"Science knows no country, because knowledge belongs to humanity, and is the torch which illuminates the world."
"I am on the edge of mysteries and the veil is getting thinner and thinner."
"I am utterly convinced that Science and Peace will triumph over Ignorance and War, that nations will eventually unite not to destroy but to edify, and that the future will belong to those who have done the most for the sake of suffering humanity."
"One does not ask of one who suffers: What is your country and what is your religion? One merely says: You suffer, that is enough for me."
Membership
In 1869, Louis Pasteur was elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society.
In 1873, he was elected a Member of the Academy of Medicine.
In 1880, Pasteur became a Member of the Central Society of Veterinary Medicine.
In 1883, he became a Foreign Member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.
The Royal Society
,
United Kingdom
1869
The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
,
Netherlands
1883
The Academy of Medicine
1873
The Central Society of Veterinary Medicine
1880
Personality
Louis Pasteur was frank, stubborn, prodigiously self-confident, intensely serious - almost somber - and rather aloof toward those outside his select circle. Obsessed with his work, he brooked no interference with it. Sincerely kind to children, he could be insensitive and exploitative to others.
His passion for tidiness and cleanliness approached the eccentric, and fear of infection allegedly made him wary of shaking hands or of eating without first wiping the dinnerware and scrutinizing his food.
Pasteur tended to be highly secretive about the general direction of his current work, even with his most trusted assistants; and his insistence on absolute control of his laboratory reportedly extended even to the recording of experimental notes and the labeling of animal cages.
An innovative administrator and fastidious organizer, Pasteur showed a legendary devotion to detail. As director of scientific studies at the École Normale Supreriere, he proposed procedural and structural reforms, notably with regard to the agrégé-préparateurs (laboratory assistant who were graduates of the school); founded a journal, Annales scientifiques de École normale superieure; and raised the standards and reputation of the scientific section so that it began to challenge the École Polytechnique. On the other hand, Pasteur's handling of student discipline betrayed an inflexible and rather authoritarian spirit. His relations with students were described as "hardly frequent" but "often disagreeable." He dealt summarily, unsympathetically, and sometimes arbitrarily with student complaints about food and rules; and by 1863 he was openly appalled by what he considered student insubordination. In 1867 Pasteur was removed from his post as administrator and director of scientific studies precisely because of his rigid and unpopular stand against a student protest involving free speech and anti-imperial sentiment.
Physical Characteristics:
Louis Pasteur suffered a series of strokes beginning in 1868. He was severely impaired following a stroke in 1894 stroke and never recovered fully.
Interests
Fishing, sketching
Connections
While working as a professor of chemistry at the University of Strasbourg, Louis Pasteur fell in love with Marie Laurent, daughter of the university's rector, and married her in 1849.
The couple had five children: Jeanne, Jean-Baptiste, Cécile, Marie-Louise, and Camille. But only Jean-Baptiste and Marie-Louise survived to adulthood. The other three children died of diseases and these personal tragedies strengthened Pasteur's resolve to find cures for infectious diseases.