50 Years Ago

The capacity exhibited by all organisms to develop tolerance for new environmental conditions has been an important factor in the continuing existence of life on Earth. It has also had adverse effects on some creatures. To man, one of the most disturbing of these effects is being manifested through the resistance certain microbes develop for the 'wonder' drugs he uses to counteract microbial diseases. The peculiar capacity of pathogenic micro-organisms to develop strains which are resistant to drugs which on initial application are lethal to most individuals — and eventually to thrive on those drugs — did not come into clear focus until Paul Ehrlich et al. made their famous chemotherapeutic researches during the first decade of this century.

From Nature 26 September 1964

100 Years Ago

The council of the Senate of the University of Cambridge has offered to professors, teachers, and students of the University of Louvain such facilities in the way of access to libraries, laboratories, and lectures, together with the use of lecture-rooms, as may secure the continuity of the work of that University during the present crisis. Hospitality in the way of living accommodation and so forth will probably be offered by the individual colleges and by private residents. The professors of the University of Oxford have offered a home for the winter to the young children of the professors of the University of Louvain; and the academic staff of University College (University of London) offers hospitality to about seventy members of French and Belgian universities, whether professors, teachers, or students, men or women, who may find it necessary to take refuge in this country.

From Nature 24 September 1914