Antoine Béchamp
| Antoine Béchamp | |
|---|---|
Antoine Béchamp
|
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| Born |
October 16, 1816 Bassing, Moselle, France |
| Died | April 15, 1908 (aged 91) Paris, France |
| Nationality | French |
| Fields | Biology |
Pierre Jacques Antoine Béchamp (October 16, 1816 – April 15, 1908) was a French scientist now best known for breakthroughs in applied organic chemistry and for a bitter rivalry with Louis Pasteur. Béchamp developed the Béchamp reduction, an inexpensive method to produce aniline dye, permitting Perkin to launch the synthetic-dye industry. Béchamp also synthesized the first organic arsenical drug, arsanilic acid, from which Ehrlich later synthesized the first chemotherapeutic drug. Béchamp's rivalry with Pasteur was initially for priority in attributing fermentation to microorganisms, later for attributing the silkworm disease pebrine to microorganisms, and eventually over the validity of germ theory. Béchamp also disputed cell theory.
Claiming discovery that the "molecular granulations" in biological fluids were actually the elementary units of life, Béchamp named them microzymas—that is, "tiny enzymes"—and credited them with producing both enzymes and cells while "evolving" amid favorable conditions into multicellular organisms. Denying that bacteria could invade a healthy animal and cause disease, Béchamp claimed instead that unfavorable host and environmental conditions destabilize the host's native microzymas, whereupon they decompose host tissue by producing pathogenic bacteria. While cell theory and germ theory gained widespread acceptance, granular theories became obscure. Béchamp's version, microzymian theory, has been retained by small groups, especially in alternative medicine.
Béchamp was born in Bassing, France in 1816, the son of a miller. He lived in Bucharest, Romania from the ages of 7 to 18 with an uncle who worked in the French ambassador's office. He was educated at the University of Strasbourg, receiving a doctor of science degree in 1853 and doctor of medicine in 1856, and ran a pharmacy in the city. In 1854 was appointed Professor of Chemistry at the University of Strasbourg, a post previously held by Louis Pasteur.
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