Agostino BassiBorn 25 Sep 1773; died 6 Feb 1856 at age 82. Agostino Marla Bassi de Lodi was an Italian entomologist, botanist and bacteriologist kown as the “Father of Insect Pathology” for his pioneering work investigating the cause of transmission of disease in animals. Ten years before Louis Pasteur found disease-causing microorganisms. Bassi showed (1835-6) that a silk worm disease was contagious and could be transmitted naturally by direct contact or infected food, or experimentally by means of a pin previously sterilized in a flame. The causative agent was later shown to be a fungus that multiplied in and on the body of the insect. This was the first microorganism to be recognized as a contagious agent of animal disease. Thus, the first animal pathogen to be understood was of insects, not humans. In 1844, he believed that “contagion by living organisms” also infected humans with measles, syphilis, and the plague.Image: B.bassiana fungus on soybean loopers. [Day of death from DSB 6 Feb 1856. EB gives died 8 Feb 1856.] |
