Who is this?

This eminent physician and researcher, landing here for the 186th installment of this Medical Examiner feature, suggests how many people have contributed to the state of medicine as it exists in 2023. The talent pool seems almost inexhaustible.

Students of medical history may very well recognize him. This is Robert Koch, who fathered more branches of medicine (at least three) than he and his wife did children (one).

Born in Germany in 1843 as the third of thirteen siblings, Koch was brilliant from the start. He had already taught himself to read and write before entering school at 5 years old. His university career began at age 19, where he embarked on the study of mathematics, physics, and botany, but after just three months he changed his major to medicine. Within a few semesters he was studying and performing research with notable mentors like Jacob Henle and Rudolf Virchow, probably unfamiliar names to most of us, but potential subjects for future editions of Who is this? in their own right.

Upon graduation in 1866, Koch began his career as a general physician, working at such institutions as the General Hospital in Hamburg and the Idiot’s Hospital in Langenhagen before becoming a volunteer surgeon for the German army in 1871 during the Franco-Prussian War. After the war, his wife gave him a microscope as a birthday present, and the rest, as the old saying goes, is history. That gift is the reason why many view Robert Koch (along with Louis Pasteur, with whom Koch had a frosty relationship) as the father of microbiology, and as one of the founders of modern bacteriology, specifically medical bacteriology. His discoveries paved the way for establishing germ theory as the cause of disease, and provided public health with an actual scientific basis upon which to build its policies.

It was Robert Koch who invented a standard means of studying bacteria in the lab: coating a glass slide or other surface with agar coated with a thin layer of gelatin, then introducing bacterial samples. The method is still used to this day, and enjoyed the additional enhancement of small shallow covered dishes that Koch’s assistant Julius Petri developed.

Through his studies, Koch was able to identify four basic principles (“Koch’s Postulates”) that enable clear connections between pathogens and diseases to be established or discounted. Using these principles in the investigation of disease, Koch was able to discover the cause of cholera, tuberculosis, and anthrax, findings that led directly to effective efforts to prevent and treat these deadly diseases.

World Tuberculosis Day has been observed every March 24 since 1982, the 100th anniversary of the day Robert Koch announced his discovery of the tuberculosis bacterium. For that accomplishment, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1905.

Koch suffered a heart attack in early April 1910 from which he never fully recovered. He died about 7 weeks later at age 66 +