The Invention of Penicillin

This life-saving drug penicillin only exists because a scientist was too lazy to clean up his laboratory. Here's what happened. So we all know that penicillin now is the antibiotic hero for treating bacterial infections like pneumonia, strep throat, and even more serious diseases. And it all starts with this guy, Alexander Fleming, in 1928. He's a scientist in London studying bacteria, but there's just one problem. He's not exactly known for being neat and tidy. So one day he's experimenting with bacteria in the lab when suddenly— oh shoot, he forgot about his upcoming vacation. Panicked and time-crunched, he rushes home to pack. But back at the lab, he forgot to do something. He left a petri dish out on his workbench. And when he comes back, he notices something really weird. Mold is growing on the dish. But here's the kicker: the bacteria around that mold, it was dead. The mold was killing it. Instead of tossing the dish out, Fleming realizes the miracle at work here. So he names the mold penicillin, but he's still got a problem. The miracle drug is too hard to produce in large quantities. So he partners with a US pharmaceutical company who scales the production during World War II. And that's when penicillin truly becomes a life-saving, commercially successful drug.