Producing penicillin, 1943

Producing penicillin, 1943. Two photographs of different stages in the production of penicillin, taken by James Jarche, and published in 'Illustrated' magazine. The top photograph shows a technician with a large autoclave, used to sterilise the glass flasks needed to grow the penicillin mould. The second photograph shows a chemist with a stack of glass flasks. Each contains penicillin mould growing in a wrinkled layer called a 'felt'. During this process the mould exudes penicillin into the growing solution from which it can later be extracted. Each flask contains enough mould to produce a single dose of penicillin. However it takes another three weeks to extract and purify the drug. In 1934, Odhams, publishers of the Daily Herald, launched the magazine 'Weekly Illustrated'. Based on European ideas of photoreportage it was the first British picture magazine. In 1939 the magazine changed its name to 'Illustrated'. It continued to be published until 1958. ©SSPL/NMeM/Daily Herald Archive