World of Microbiology and Immunology on Robert Hooke
One of the preeminent scientists of the seventeenth century, Robert Hooke is perhaps best remembered for the wide variety of fields to which he contributed, including physics, astronomy, microscopy, biology, and architecture, among others. Although Hooke introduced many concepts previously unimagined or unexamined, his ability to formulate these ideas usually did not match his intuition, and the credit for many scientific breakthroughs inspired by Hooke's ideas is often given to such scientists as Isaac Newton and Christiaan Huygens, who brought the work to its fruition. Still, Hooke remains an important pioneer of science.
Born on Britain's Isle of Wight, Hooke was a sickly child. As a youth, his perpetual ill health made it impossible for him to attend classes regularly, and he was unable to enter the ministry as his father, a minister, had wished. Instead, Hooke was allowed to pursue his interest in mechanics, which he first demonstrated as a small child by constructing elaborate toys. He attended Westminster School and later Oxford, where he became the laboratory assistant to Robert Boyle. It was in Boyle' s lab that Hooke's talent for designing scientific instruments was noticed, as he constructed the improved air pump used to establish Boyle's gas laws. In fact, it has been speculated that Hooke himself may have been the author of Boyle's law, since, customarily, any findings from research done in the lab would have been credited to the professor.
Along with some of his colleagues from Oxford and the surrounding area, Hooke helped to establish what would soon become the Royal Society, to which he was appointed Curator of Experiments. During his time as Curator he had many other successes attributed to him such as the compound microscope, an improved barometer, the reflecting telescope, and the universal joint.
Although Hooke was not the first to experiment using a microscope, he was the first to dedicate a major intensive volume to microscopy. His 1665 publication Micrographia describes the structures of insects, fossils, and plants in unprecedented detail. While studying the porous structure of cork, Hooke noted the presence of tiny rectangular holes that he called cells, a word that has been adopted as the cornerstone of microbiology. Micrographia also contains illustrations in Hooke's own hand that remain among the best renderings of microscopic views.
In the years following the great London fire of 1666, Hooke became a surveyor and, eventually, an architect, constructing numerous famous buildings. Because his architectural interests took much time away from his scientific work, he was ultimately forced to retire as Curator of Experiments for the Royal Society in favor of his new vocation.
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