page_title: List of Dutch discoveries
section_title: Micro-organisms (1670s)
hierarchical_section_title: List of Dutch discoveries / Discoveries / Microbiology / Micro-organisms (1670s)
caption_attribution_description: Leeuwenhoek_Microscope_Replica
context_page_description: The Netherlands had a considerable part in the making of modern society. The Netherlands and its people have made numerous seminal contributions to the world's civilization, especially in art, science, technology and engineering, economics and finance, cartography and geography, exploration and navigation, law and jurisprudence, thought and philosophy, medicine, and agriculture. Dutch-speaking people, in spite of their relatively small number, have a significant history of invention, innovation, discovery and exploration. The following list is composed of objects, unknown lands, breakthrough ideas/concepts, principles, phenomena, processes, methods, techniques, styles etc., that were discovered or invented by people from the Netherlands and Dutch-speaking people from the former Southern Netherlands. Until the fall of Antwerp, the Dutch and Flemish were generally seen as one people.
context_section_description: A resident of Delft, Anton van Leeuwenhoek, used a high-power single-lens simple microscope to discover the world of micro-organisms. His simple microscopes were made of silver or copper frames, holding hand-ground lenses were capable of magnification up to 275 times. Using these he was the first to observe and describe single-celled organisms, which he originally referred to as animalcules, and which now referred to as micro-organisms or microbes.
  Infusoria (1674) – Infusoria is a collective term for minute aquatic creatures including ciliate, euglena, paramecium, protozoa and unicellular algae that exist in freshwater ponds. However, in formal classification microorganism called infusoria belongs to Kingdom Animalia, Phylum Protozoa, Class Ciliates (Infusoria). They were first discovered by Antoni van Leeuwenhoek.
  Protozoa (1674) – In 1674, Van Leeuwenhoek was the first person to observe and describe protozoa.
  Bacteria (1676) – The first bacteria were observed by van Leeuwenhoek in 1676 using his single-lens microscope. He described the creatures he saw as small creatures. The name bacterium was introduced much later, by Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg in 1828, derived from the Greek word βακτηριον meaning "small stick". Because of the difficulty in describing individual bacteria and the importance of their discovery, the study of bacteria is generally that of the study of microbiology.
  Sperm cells (1677) – Sperm cells were first observed by Anton van Leeuwenhoek in 1677. The term "sperm" refers to the male reproductive cells. A uniflagellar sperm cell that is motile is referred to as a "spermatozoon", whereas a non-motile sperm cell is referred to as a "spermatium".
  Spermatozoa (1677) – A spermatozoon or spermatozoon (pl. spermatozoa), from the ancient Greek σπερμα (seed) and ζων (alive) and more commonly known as a sperm cell, is the haploid cell that is the male gamete. Sperm cells were first observed by a student of van Leeuwenhoek in 1677. Leeuwenhoek pictured sperm cells with great accuracy.
  Giardia (1681) – Giardia is a genus of anaerobic flagellated protozoan parasites of the phylum Sarcomastigophora that colonise and reproduce in the small intestines of several vertebrates, causing giardiasis. Their life cycle alternates between an actively swimming trophozoite and an infective, resistant cyst. The trophozoite form of Giardia was first observed in 1681 by Van Leeuwenhoek during observation of his own stool.
  Volvox (1700)- Volvox is a genus of chlorophytes, a type of green algae. It forms spherical colonies of up to 50,000 cells. They live in a variety of freshwater habitats, and were first reported by Van Leeuwenhoek in 1700.
caption: Replica of microscope by Leeuwenhoek. Van Leeuwenhoek is considered to be the first to observe and describe microorganisms (animalcules) using a microscope.
exif: {}