Selman Waksman discovered life-saving antibacterial compounds and his investigations spawned further studies for other disease-curing drugs. Waksman isolated streptomycin, the first chemical agent effective against tuberculosis. Prior to Waksman's discovery, tuberculosis was often a lifelong debilitating disease, and was fatal in some forms. Streptomycin effected a powerful and wide-ranging cure, and for this discovery, Waksman received the 1952 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine. In pioneering the field of antibiotic research, Waksman had an inestimable impact on human health.

The only son of a Jewish furniture textile weaver, Selman Abraham Waksman was born in the tiny Russian village of Novaya Priluka on July 22, 1888. Life was hard in late-nineteenth-century Russia. Waksman's only sister died from diphtheria when he was nine. There were particular tribulations for members of a persecuted ethnic minority. As a teen during the Russian revolution, Waksman helped organize an armed Jewish youth defense group to counteract oppression...