Microbiology

Microbiology has a long and distinguished history at The University of Chicago. The Department of Microbiology evolved from the Departments of Pathology and Pathology & Bacteriology and included world renown scientists such as Howard Taylor Ricketts, William H. Taliaferro, Lowell T. Coggeshall, William Burrows and James Moulder. Howard Taylor Ricketts identified rickettsiae as the causative agents of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever and Typhus. William Taliaferro and Lowell Coggeshall, both members of the National Academy of Sciences, served as Chairmen of the Department and later Deans of the Division of Biological Sciences. Successive editions of Burrows' textbook in Medical Microbiology served the needs of medical schools for decades. Jim Moulder served as chairman of the Department of Microbiology and as a leader in chlamydial research. By 1984, the Department of Microbiology was dissolved as part of a re-structuring of the Biological Sciences Division at the University of Chicago. At this time, the Department of Microbiology boasts international leadership and world class faculty.