Friedrich Julius Rosenbach

Friedrich Julius Rosenbach, also known as Anton Julius Friedrich Rosenbach, was a German physician and microbiologist born on 16 December 1842 in Grohnde an der Weser. He studied at Heidelberg, Göttingen, Vienna, Paris and Berlin and obtained his doctorate in 1867. His best known work came in 1884, when he is credited with differentiating Staphylococcus aureus from Staphylococcus albus, the organism now called Staphylococcus epidermidis. He also described and named Streptococcus pyogenes, and Rosenbach's disease is named in his honor. His publications dealt with wound infection diseases, tetanus, erysipeloid, hospital gangrene and deep suppurating skin infections, and he contributed chapters to German handbooks of therapy and practical medicine. He married Franziska Merkel in 1877 and died in Göttingen on 6 December 1923.