A gifted researcher in therapeutic chemistry, Daniele Bovet was born in Neuchatel, Switzerland, one of four children of a professor of experimental education. Bovet studied zoology and comparative anatomy at the University of Geneva, receiving his doctor of science degree in 1929. He then joined the Pasteur Institute in Paris, becoming director of the Laboratory of Therapeutic Chemistry in 1936.

In 1935 a German biochemist, Gerhard Domagk, discovered that the orange-red dye sulfamyldiamino benzene killed streptococci (disease-causing bacteria). Bovet noted that while the dye killed the bacteria in the human body, it failed to do so in laboratory cultures. He theorized that the dye must be broken down into simpler compounds in the body, and that one of these simpler substances worked against the streptococci. Accordingly, Bovet broke down the dye and isolated its compounds, one of which was sulfanilamide, which Bovet showed in 1935 killed streptococci in both the body and...