Gustav Giemsa was a German chemist

Chemist

A chemist is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties such as density and acidity. Chemists carefully describe the properties they study in terms of quantities, with detail on the level of molecules and their component atoms...

 and bacteriologist who was a native of Medar-Blechhammer

Blachownia

Blachownia is a town in Częstochowa County, Silesian Voivodeship, Poland. It lies about 10 km west of the city of Częstochowa.-External links:***...

. He is remembered for creating a dye solution commonly known as "Giemsa stain

Giemsa stain

Giemsa stain, named after Gustav Giemsa, an early German microbiologist, is used in cytogenetics and for the histopathological diagnosis of malaria and other parasites.-Uses:...

". This dye is used for the histopathological

Histopathology

Histopathology refers to the microscopic examination of tissue in order to study the manifestations of disease...

 diagnosis of malaria

Malaria

Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease of humans and other animals caused by eukaryotic protists of the genus Plasmodium. The disease results from the multiplication of Plasmodium parasites within red blood cells, causing symptoms that typically include fever and headache, in severe cases...

 and parasites such as Plasmodium

Plasmodium

Plasmodium is a genus of parasitic protists. Infection by these organisms is known as malaria. The genus Plasmodium was described in 1885 by Ettore Marchiafava and Angelo Celli. Currently over 200 species of this genus are recognized and new species continue to be described.Of the over 200 known...

, Trypanosoma

Trypanosoma

Trypanosoma is a genus of kinetoplastids , a monophyletic group of unicellular parasitic flagellate protozoa. The name is derived from the Greek trypano and soma because of their corkscrew-like motion. All trypanosomes are heteroxenous and are transmitted via a vector...

, and Chlamydia

Chlamydia (bacterium)

Chlamydia is a genus of bacteria that are obligate intracellular parasites. Chlamydia infections are the most common bacterial sexually transmitted infections in humans and are the leading cause of infectious blindness worldwide....

.

Giemsa studied pharmacy

Pharmacy

Pharmacy is the health profession that links the health sciences with the chemical sciences and it is charged with ensuring the safe and effective use of pharmaceutical drugs...

 and mineralogy

Mineralogy

Mineralogy is the study of chemistry, crystal structure, and physical properties of minerals. Specific studies within mineralogy include the processes of mineral origin and formation, classification of minerals, their geographical distribution, as well as their utilization.-History:Early writing...

 at the University of Leipzig

University of Leipzig

The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...

, and chemistry and bacteriology at the University of Berlin. Between 1895 and 1898 he worked as a pharmacist

Pharmacist

Pharmacists are allied health professionals who practice in pharmacy, the field of health sciences focusing on safe and effective medication use...

 in German East Africa

German East Africa

German East Africa was a German colony in East Africa, which included what are now :Burundi, :Rwanda and Tanganyika . Its area was , nearly three times the size of Germany today....

. He was an early assistant to Bernhard Nocht at the Institut für Tropenmedizin

Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine

Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine; is a medical institution based in Hamburg, Germany which is dedicated to research, treatment, training and therapy of tropical and infectious diseases....

in Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

, where in 1900 he became head of the Department of Chemistry.

In 1904 Giemsa published an essay on the staining procedure for flagellate

Flagellate

Flagellates are organisms with one or more whip-like organelles called flagella. Some cells in animals may be flagellate, for instance the spermatozoa of most phyla. Flowering plants do not produce flagellate cells, but ferns, mosses, green algae, some gymnosperms and other closely related plants...

s, blood cells, and bacteria. Giemsa improved the Romanowsky stain

Romanowsky stain

Romanowsky staining is a prototypical staining technique that was the forerunner of several distinct but similar methods, including Giemsa, Jenner, Wright, Field, and Leishman stains, which are used to differentiate cells in pathologic specimens....

 (Eosin Y

Eosin Y

Eosin Y is a form of eosin....

 and Methylene Blue

Methylene blue

Methylene blue is a heterocyclic aromatic chemical compound with the molecular formula C16H18N3SCl. It has many uses in a range of different fields, such as biology and chemistry. At room temperature it appears as a solid, odorless, dark green powder, that yields a blue solution when dissolved in...

) by stabilizing this dye solution with glycerol

Glycerol

Glycerol is a simple polyol compound. It is a colorless, odorless, viscous liquid that is widely used in pharmaceutical formulations. Glycerol has three hydroxyl groups that are responsible for its solubility in water and its hygroscopic nature. The glycerol backbone is central to all lipids...

. This allowed for reproducible staining of cells for microscopy purposes. This method is still used in laboratories today.

External links

• The Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine