Year 5 : The
Unseen Life - Microorganisms
All living
things are created by God. Humans, animals and plants are living things. They
vary in size and can be seen with naked eyes. However, there are tiny living
things that can only be seen through a microscope. There are called microorganisms.
Microorganisms are very tiny
one-celled organisms.There are different
types of microorganisms. Viruses, fungi, protozoa and bacteria are found everywhere in
the world. They are found in all living things, plants and animal. There are
more microorganisms on and inside your body than there are cells that make up
your entire body. Microorganisms can live in the air, on land, and in fresh or
salt water environments. Some of them, pathogens, can be harmful and causes
diseases, but there are some microorganisms that are needed for living things
to survive.
The first microcope |
Anton van Leeuwenhoek, 1632-1723, Wine Assayer, Surveyor, Cloth Merchant, Minor Public Official, and Inventor
Leeuwenhoek was a man
with many talents, his most important attributes were creativity, power of observation,
and ingenuity. Leeuwenhoek was a common man without any fortune or formal
education, so he had to work for a living. Leeuwenhoek made simple (one lens)
microscopes. He was not the first person to build a microscope, but the
microscopes that he did build were the best ones for that time period.
Leeuwenhoek was the first person to describe bacteria (from teeth scrapings),
protozoans (from pond water), helped to prove the theory of blood circulation.
He gained much of his inspiration form reading Hooke'sMicrographia.
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