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Howard Florey, Alexander Fleming and the Fairy Tale of Penicillin
Author(s) -
Goldsworthy Peter D,
McFarlane Alexander C
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
medical journal of australia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.904
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1326-5377
pISSN - 0025-729X
DOI - 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2002.tb04349.x
Subject(s) - queen (butterfly) , art , classics , hymenoptera , biology , botany
The public myth of the discovery of penicillin is an archetypal "quest story" of the type common to every human culture. But the real story of the discovery, testing and refinement of penicillin is a complex tale of accident, serendipity, oversight, conflict, the pressure of war, idiosyncratic personalities and even--the invention of history.