Why microorganisms have their international day!
Why microorganisms have their international day!
Prof Isabel Sá-Correia*
*based on an Opinion article published in the Portuguese daily newspaper Jornal in the run up to International Microorganism Day 2021.
Microbiology has jumped into the mass media and has been in the spotlight around the world. The public health crisis caused by the new coronavirus has shown the need for governments and society in general to pay microorganisms due attention. It also started to give value to specialists and disseminators who, make this scientific knowledge understandable by the common citizen. It is only an understanding or literacy of microbiology that will allow citizens to understand and trust this science and reject unfounded and obscure theories. Two years ago, who would have believed that concepts such as epidemiology, immunology, PCR tests, virus variants, RNA vaccines would come to be understood by so many. Governments also attempted to inform their political decisions with scientific advice to minimize erratic and harmful measures for the health and economy of countries and citizens. But will this trend extend to other areas of microbiology where essential and difficult individual and political decisions are also needed? Will due attention be given to the exploitation of microbiological resources of interest in Biotechnology to promote an increasingly sustainable bioeconomy, capable of generating benefits for the economy, the environment and society? This is now a priority as the time to counter climate change is running out and the associated economic and social costs could far exceed those of the pandemic. Also, a greater knowledge and control of the activity of harmful microorganisms allows an adequate response to the challenges they pose to human and animal health, agriculture and food quality and safety.
International Microorganism Day (IMD), 17 September, was created to highlight the role that an invisible multitude of very diverse living beings play in the life sciences, in everyday life, in a wide range of professional activities and career opportunities. On September 17, 1683, the Dutch merchant Anton van Leeuwenhoek, without fortune or academic degrees, sent a letter to the Royal Society of London in which he gave an exquisite description of the first observation of live bacteria present in dental plaque. This curious citizen, though an unlikely scientist, had perfected an optical lens system making extraordinary magnifications possible for the time. These revealed microscopic life; the foundations of microbiology were laid! A founder of modern microbiology, Louis Pasteur, considered that “the role of the infinitely small in nature is infinitely large” so efforts put into the dissemination and literacy of society in microbiology will facilitate informed choices related to vaccination, use of antibiotics, quality control and food safety, advanced biofuels...
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek
On September 17, 1683, the Dutch merchant Anton van Leeuwenhoek, without fortune or academic degrees, sent a letter to the Royal Society of London in which he gave an exquisite description of the first observation of live bacteria present in dental plaque.
IMD celebrations began in Portugal in 2017, promoted by the Portuguese Society of Microbiology (SPM) and other national associations related to life sciences and science dissemination. The SPM catalyzed the internationalization of the Day with the support of prestigious international scientific societies, especially FEMS (Federation of the European Microbiological Societies). Records of commemorations held in higher education institutions and research centres, museums, schools, living science centres, are available on the IMD bilingual website. They were organized by many thousands of professors, researchers, graduate students and other professionals of microbiology. They combined open laboratories, exhibitions where visitors could see or make their own experiments and taste products of microbiological origin, teacher training actions, debates and lectures on social impact topics and hot topics in modern microbiology. During the pandemic, in 2020, a continuous 24-hour live microbiology broadcast was organized over the internet (available on Youtube). Several thousand viewers from around the world have been online showing the reach of the IMD.
IMD2021 returned with a borderless meeting to celebrate microbiology through an online broadcast at https://www.internationalmicroorganismday.org/ . This took place between 12:00 noon on Thursday 16th September and 12:00 noon on Friday 17th and the recording will be available on Youtube. To share information, tag the IMD (@IntMicroDay) and use the hashtag #InternationalMicroorganismDay. Since its first edition, Técnico joined and promoted the IMD. At https://diainternacionaldomicrorganismo.tecnico.ulisboa.pt/ you can attend the talks that are also part of the international program in order to reach the many millions of Portuguese speakers around the world. On this website you will also find other microbiological information. Join us and everyone around the world who will celebrate microbiology on Microorganism Day!
Isabel Sá-Correia, Distinguished Professor of Biological Sciences at Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon; President of the Portuguese Society of Microbiology from 2009 to 2020.