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The first bacteria cell description was first describe by Antony van Leeuwenhoek in a letter wrote to the Royal Society of London on September 17, 1683.

''a little white matter, which is as thick as if 'twere batter." He repeated these observations on two ladies (probably his own wife and daughter), and on two old men who had never cleaned their teeth in their lives. Looking at these samples with his microscope, Leeuwenhoek reported how in his own mouth: "I then most always saw, with great wonder, that in the said matter there were many very little living animalcules, very prettily a-moving. The biggest sort. . . had a very strong and swift motion, and shot through the water (or spittle) like a pike does through the water. The second sort. . . oft-times spun round like a top. . . and these were far more in number." In the mouth of one of the old men, Leeuwenhoek found "an unbelievably great company of living animalcules, a-swimming more nimbly than any I had ever seen up to this time. The biggest sort. . . bent their body into curves in going forwards. . . Moreover, the other animalcules were in such enormous numbers, that all the water. . . seemed to be alive." These were among the first observations on living bacteria ever recorded.''

In reality, many people in earlier time could have seen bacteria as a biofilm like cyanobacterial blooms without knowing what it was...

But the first single bacterium cell seen and repertoried was on September 17, 1683 by Antony van Leeuwenhoek, the father of the microscopy.

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14y ago

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