French microbiologists

Didier Raoult (French pronunciation: [didje ʁa.ul(t)]; born 13 March 1952) is a retired French physician and microbiologist specialising in infectious diseases. He taught about infectious diseases at the Faculty of Medicine of Aix-Marseille University (AMU), and in 1984, created the Rickettsia Unit of the university. From 2008 to 2022, Raoult was the director of the Unité de Recherche sur les Maladies Infectieuses et Tropicales Emergentes. He gained significant worldwide attention during the COVID-19 pandemic for vocally promoting hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for the disease, despite the lack of evidence for its effectiveness and the subsequent opposition from NIH and WHO to its use for the treatment of COVID-19 in hospitalized patients.As of 2024, nine of Raoult's research publications have been retracted, and another 55 of his publications have received an expression of concern from their publishers, due to questions related to ethics approval for his studies.

Ernest Mosny (4 January 1861 – 25 April 1918) was a French physician and hygienist born in La Fère, Aisne.Mosny served as médecin des hopitaux in Paris, and was a member of the Académie de Médecine and the Conseil supérieur d'hygiène.
He is remembered for his work in the field of microbiology. With Joaquín Albarrán (1860–1912) he performed a series of tests in an attempt to find an antidote to the colon bacillus. Eventually the two scientists developed a vaccine that achieved a high degree of immunity in dogs and rabbits. In 1912 with biologist Edouard Dujardin-Beaumetz (1868–1947), he studied the effects of bubonic plague in two Alpine marmots during hibernation. Reportedly, the marmots were able to survive 61 and 115 days after being injected with the disease.In 1911 Mosny reported the first successful embolectomy, a direct arterial surgical procedure that was performed on the femoral artery.

René Dujarric de la Rivière (19 April 1885 – 28 November 1969) was a French microbiologist and hygienist.
He studied medicine in Bordeaux and Lyon, then for several years worked as a medical extern at the Hospitals Necker and Ténon in Paris (1905–10). In 1913 he received his medical doctorate, and in 1929, obtained his doctorate in natural sciences. From 1945 to 1958 he was an assistant director of the Pasteur Institute.In 1918 he demonstrated that influenza was caused by a filterable agent that was in all probability a virus. In the 1920s he performed research of Amanita phalloides (death cap mushroom) in Louis Lapicque's laboratory at the Sorbonne, producing an antitoxic serum (serum antiphallinique) as a result. In 1927, at the Pasteur Institute, he established a center for the study of blood groups.In 1930, with Jules Bordet, he founded the Société Internationale de Microbiologie. He was a member of the Société de biologie (from 1928), the Académie Nationale de Médecine (from 1945, department of hygiene) and in 1951, was appointed president of the Société mycologique de France.

Charles Edouard Chamberland (French pronunciation: [ʃaʁl ʃɑ̃bɛʁlɑ̃]; 12 March 1851 – 2 May 1908) was a French microbiologist from Chilly-le-Vignoble in the department of Jura who worked with Louis Pasteur.

In 1884 he developed a type of filtration known today as the Chamberland filter or Chamberland-Pasteur filter, a device that made use of an unglazed porcelain bar. The filter had pores that were smaller than bacteria, thus making it possible to pass a solution containing bacteria through the filter, and having the bacteria completely removed from the solution. Chamberland was also credited for starting a research project that led to the invention of the autoclave device in 1879.

Léopold Nègre (15 June 1879 – 29 July 1961) was a French physician and biologist born in Montpellier.
He studied natural sciences at the University of Montpellier, followed by courses in microbiology at the Pasteur Institute in Paris. From 1907 to 1910, he served as préparateur at the laboratory of microbiology courses headed by Amédée Borrel (1867–1936). In 1910, he obtained his doctorate of medicine. Following an internship at the Pasteur Institute in Lille, he was appointed laboratory chief (microbial analysis) at the Pasteur Institute in Algiers. In 1918 he received his doctorate of natural sciences.
In 1919, he was assigned to the laboratory of tuberculosis headed by Albert Calmette (1863–1933) at the Pasteur Institute in Paris. Here he took part in research of Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG vaccine). With microbiologist Alfred Boquet (1879–1947) he developed antigene méthylique (methyl antigen) for treatment of tuberculosis.In 1931, Nègre became chair at the Institut Pasteur, and in 1944 was named vice president of the Société de biologie. He was also president of the Société française de la tuberculose (1950) and a member of the Académie de Médecine (hygiene section, from 1951).

Henri-Mamert-Onésime Delafond (13 February 1805 – 15 November 1861) was a French veterinarian born in Saint-Amand-en-Puisaye, Nièvre department. Delafond was one of the primary representatives of veterinary science in France during the first half of the nineteenth century.He served as a professor and director of the Maisons-Alfort veterinary school. He was a member of the Académie de Médecine and of the Société nationale d'agriculture.Delafond is remembered for pioneer microscopic research of Bacillus anthracis, the causative organism of anthrax. Also, with microbiologist David Gruby (1810–1898), he performed extensive investigations of Tritrichomonas suis, a parasite found in swine.
In 1842 with Gabriel Andral (1797–1876) and Jules Gavarret (1809–1890), he was co-author of an important treatise on domestic animal blood composition titled Recherches sur la composition du sang de quelques animaux domestiques, dans l’état de santé et de maladie. With Honoré Bourguignon, he published Traité pratique d'entomologie et de pathologie comparées de la psore ou gale de l'homme et des animaux domestiques (Treatise on the entomology and comparative pathology of scabies affecting humans and domesticated animals).

Casimir-Joseph Davaine (19 March 1812 – 14 October 1882) was a French physician known for his work in the field of microbiology. He was a native of Saint-Amand-les-Eaux, department of Nord.
In 1850, Davaine along with French pathologist Pierre François Olive Rayer, discovered a certain microorganism in the blood of diseased and dying sheep. In the diseased blood, Rayer and Davaine observed the bacillus that is known today as Bacillus anthracis, the causative bacterium of anthrax. Soon afterwards, Rayer published a description of the bacillus in a paper titled, Inoculation du sang de rate (1850).In 1863, Davaine demonstrated that the bacillus could be directly transmitted from one animal to another. He was able to identify the causative organism, but was unaware of its true etiology. Later on, German microbiologist Robert Koch investigated the etiology of Bacillus anthracis, and discovered its ability to produce "resting spores" that could stay alive in the soil for a long period of time to serve as a future source of infection.Casimir Davaine is also credited for pioneer work in the study of sepsis (blood poisoning).