1) Why is the microscope important in the development in the development of microbiology? Who were the pioneers in the development of the microscope?
2) What is spontaneous generation? How was the theory disproved, and by whom?
3) What role did Louis Pasteur play in the development of microbiology?
4) What role did Robert Koch play in the development of microbiology? What are Koch’s Postulates?
5) What is epidemiology? How is it related to microbiology, and what techniques were applied as a result to prevent disease?
6) What are anti-microbials? What are antibiotics? How did they change the way diseases are treated?
7) What new technologies allowed the study of viruses in the mid-20thcentury?
8) What are the main applications of microbiology?
1) What diseases were treated using surgery in the early 19thcentury? What types of surgery were not done due to the limitations of surgical techniques? What were the major problems that patients who underwent surgery encountered?
2) Why was the introduction of anesthesia such an important change in surgical practice? What did it allow surgeons to do better? What problems remained to be solved?
3) What innovation did Joseph Lister introduce to surgical practice? What impact did it have on the way other surgeons performed operations?
4) How did surgery change in the 20thcentury? What new techniques helped to make surgery more common?
1) Why was smallpox so dangerous? Who in particular was vulnerable? How likely was it to kill? What impact did the disease have if the patient survived?
2) How did Edward Jenner perform the first well-documented instance of vaccination? How did his method differ from previous methods of vaccination? What motivated him to do the experiment?
3) What were the results of his experiments? Why was his work seemingly controversial?
4) Why did Jenner have to print his experimental results himself? How did his publication differ from how other doctors approached medical treatment? What was the result of his publication on medical practice?
5) How did vaccination first spread around the world? What method was first used to transfer the vaccine across the ocean?
6) How and when was smallpox eventually eradicated?
7) Why did many ordinary people in the 19thcentury reject vaccination? Why did some doctors reject vaccination, and what were their reasons? How accurate were their objections?
8) Why did compulsory vaccination laws lead to opposition to vaccination? Why was the law socially divisive?
9) Why did alternative medicine practitioners oppose vaccination?
10) According the video, how do contemporary critics of vaccination distort evidence to support their position? Have supporters of vaccination done dishonest things as well?
11) How good a scientist was Jenner? What were the flaws in his research methods and results?
12) Who is Doctor Andrew Wakefield? Why is he well known in anti-vaccination circles?
13) Why is it important to balance benefit versus risk when it comes to vaccines?