"THE BEGINNING OF BACTERIOLOGY AS A MODERN SCIENCE": TWO LANDMARK PASTEUR PAPERS ON FERMENTATION, 1857, IN THE JOURNAL AS THEY ORIGINALLY APPEARED, UNCUT IN WRAPPERS

PASTEUR, Louis. "Mémoire sur la fermentation appele lactique"; "Mémoire sur la fermentation alcoolique." IN: Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences, Tome 45 (entire volume present), pp. 913-16 and 1032-36. WITH: BERNARD, Claude. "Sur une nouvelle function du foie chez l'homme et les animaux." IN: Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaires des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences, Tome 31 (entire volume present), pp. 571-74. Paris: Bachelier, 1857, 1850. Two volumes. Thick quarto, original tan paper wrappers, printed paper spine labels, uncut and largely unopened. Each volume housed in custom cloth clamshell box. $2900.

First editions of these two important papers by Pasteur, in the complete volumes of the Journals of the Académie des Sciences as they originally appeared.

Pasteur's first paper on fermentation reports the "first demonstration of the connection between a specific fermentation and the activity of a specific living micro-organism. This paper is often considered the beginning of bacteriology as a modern science" (Garrison-Morton 2472). This paper "contains most of the central theoretical and methodological features of his biological theory of fermentation, in particular the concept of fermentation as a product of the growth of yeast, the idea that air is source of microscopic yeasts and other micro-organisms, and the notion of specificity, in which each fermentation could be traced to a specific micro-organism. Pasteur was able to isolate, observe and propagate the yeast responsible for lactic fermentation, and to demonstrate that its activity was dependent on its environment. Pasteur's concept of fermentation as a biological process challenged the chemical theory of fermentation put forth by Liebig, which Pasteur was able to disprove with his experiments on alcoholic and acetic fermentation" (Norman 1653). The results of Pasteur's experiments on alcoholic fermentation are detailed in the second paper contained in the present volume. This is an abridged version of Pasteur's paper that underwent roughly simultaneous publication in Mémoires de la Société des Sciences, de l'Agriculture et des Arts de Lille, 1858. "The birth of bacteriology" (Grolier/Horblit 82, citing present abridged version). Dibner, Heralds of Science 198 (also citing present abridged version).

The paper by Claude Bernard offered here—along with another paper from 1848—formed the basis of his doctoral dissertation, published in 1853, which disproved two current theories of animal metabolism: first, that animals cannot synthesize sugar; and second, that sugar in the blood only occurs in diabetic or otherwise unhealthy animals. "Bernard devised a series of experiments in which healthy animals were fed either starchy or meat diets, or in some cases not fed at all for several days. He found sugar in the blood of all the animals he examined, even in those from which food had been withheld, which led him to conclude that glycemia is a normal and constant metabolic process independent of food intake, and that blood sugar must thus be produced by a source within the animal body. Upon further experimentation, he identified this source as the liver, demonstrating that it produces sugar and empties it into the blood" (Norman 200). Text in French.

Some light wear along spines. Two important scientific papers in near-fine condition, uncut in fragile original wrappers in the scientific journals as they originally appeared.