MICROBES 2000 YEARS OLD

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 192, 10 May 1921, Page 3

MICROBES 2000 YEARS OLD

Though the story of wheat taken from mummies having sprouted is flatly declared to be impossible, a report submitted to the French Academy of Science by an investigator of repute makes the story less impossible than it appeared. This report, by H. V. Galippe, states that micro-organisms found in payyri of the time of the Pharaohs are still alive. M. Galippe was led to the discovery in a rather curious way. In his work he had for years used filter paper sterilised by subjection to heat of 120 deg. contrigrade for half an hour. Investigating how far the sterilisation was complete, ho found 'by disintegrating the paper that it contained within its framework and in its fibres a large number of ovoid bacilli which were capable of movement, and which, when placed in cultures, came fully to life. Finding the microcosms go tenacious of life, it occurred to him to investigate, how long they •.•emainod alive, or at least capable of reanimation. First he treated in the same way paper manufactured in the eighteenth century, and the fibre (not the surface) of the paper yielded numerous types of micro-organisms, which lived when planted in cultures. Next he tried paper from a book printed in' 1+96 this yielded among others a bacillus identical with the tetanus bacilli. Then he delved further back among the centuries beyond Chinese MSS. and others of the earliest papers to Egyptian papyri belonging to the time of Ptolemies about 300 years before the Christian era. Ovoid bacilli, micrococci, and deplococci were found, and were planted in cultures. Within three hours these intra-cellular micro-organisms, which ■ lain motionless for so many centuries, all began to move, and in 24 hours some of them 'began to multiply and develop Later some of these were identified with organisms found in the living stalk o ie plant from'which the papyrus ot Egypt was made.— "Everyday Science.