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Superbugs

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Book cover Evolution That Anyone Can Understand

Part of the book series: SpringerBriefs in Evolutionary Biology ((BRIEFSEVOLUTION))

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Abstract

In 1928, a Scottish scientist by the name of Alexander Fleming discovered that a blue–green colored mold had contaminated a culture of Staphyloccus aureus bacteria he had been growing and appeared to be killing them. As things turned out, the discovery could be described as serendipitous, because Fleming had been working on something else at the time, and the contamination occurred while he was out of the laboratory.

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References

  • Levy SB (2002) The antibiotic paradox. Da Capo Press, Cambridge

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  • Plotkin MJ, Shnayerson M (2002) The killers within: the deadly rise of drug-resistant bacteria. Little, Brown Co, New York

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Marcus, B. (2012). Superbugs. In: Evolution That Anyone Can Understand. SpringerBriefs in Evolutionary Biology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-6126-6_6

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