Alexander Fleming

Alexander Fleming Penicillin’s discoverer
Sir Alexander Fleming was a Scottish biologist and pharmacologist. Fleming published many articles on bacteriology, immunology, and chemotherapy. His best-known achievements are the discovery of the enzyme lysozyme in 1922 and the discovery of the antibiotic substance penicillin from the fungus Penicillium notatum in 1928, for which he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945 with Florey and Chain
Investigations
By 1928, Fleming was investigating the properties of staphylococci. He was already well-known from his earlier work, and had developed a reputation as a brilliant researcher.
After returning from a long holiday, Fleming noticed that many of his culture dishes were contaminated with a fungus, and he threw the dishes in disinfectant. But subsequently, he had to show a visitor what he had been researching, and so he retrieved some of the unsubmerged (tries to mean not submerged) dishes that he would have otherwise discarded.
He then noticed a zone around an invading fungus where the bacteria could not seem to grow. Fleming proceeded to isolate an extract from the mould, correctly identified it as being from the Penicillium genus, and therefore named the agent penicillin.
Resources:
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Fleming

Borja Castellano García