Scientific and artistic collections. Letters and manuscripts

The Pasteur Museum holds substantial collections relating to the life and work of Louis Pasteur. Both a science and art museum, it is also a rare testimony to late 19th-century decorative art.

The Pasteur Museum houses rich iconographic collections dedicated to Louis Pasteur and the history of the Institut Pasteur. There are photographs illustrating Louis Pasteur and other scientists as well as paintings, engravings, drawings, sculptures, and medals.

Small bust of Pasteur

Late 19th century bronze sculpture by Adrien Gaudez (1845-1902).
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Camille Vallery-Radot

Camille Vallery-Radot, granddaughter of Louis Pasteur. Oil on canvas by Léon Bonnat (1833-1922).
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

The 3 Nobel Laureates in Medicine of 1965

François Jacob (1920-2013), Jacques Monod (1910-1976) and André Lwoff (1902-1994) on 16 October 1965. Jacques Monod's study two days after the announcement of the Nobel Prize. Jacques Monod is showing a set of dice to illustrate the rudiments of symmetry in the allosteric model.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Louis Pasteur with his family in Arbois, 1892

Louis Pasteur in his garden in Arbois during the summer of 1892. To the left of Pasteur is his granddaughter Camille Vallery-Radot. To his right is his grandson, Louis Pasteur Vallery-Radot and Mrs Pasteur. Behind Pasteur is his son-in-law, René Vallery Radot; to the left of René Vallery Radot is his wife, née Marie-Louise Pasteur, and to his right is Pasteur's nephew, Laurent.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Louis Pasteur in 1881

Scan of an old print of a photo showing Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) taken by Walery in 1881.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Medal with the face of Albert Calmette marking the centenary of his birth in 1963

Medal (obverse) with the face of Albert Calmette marking the centenary of his birth in 1963

Medal engraved by Pierre Turin (1891 - ?).

Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

3 tubes of wine

Effects of oxygen in the air on wine kept in the dark/sunlight/dark.

Plate by Lackerbauer with annotations by Louis Pasteur. 1866.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Nachet microscope

Nachet microscope with 400x magnification used by Louis Pasteur circa 1860 for his work on fermentation and spontaneous generation.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Autoclave designed by Charles Chamberland

Third autoclave designed by Charles Chamberland and used in Louis Pasteur's laboratory.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Device used by Louis Pasteur

Device used by Louis Pasteur in his laboratory to prepare pure brewer's yeast culture as part of his experiments on beer fermentation circa 1875. Exhibited in the scientific souvenir room of the Pasteur Museum.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Pasteur molten glass vase produced by Emile Gallé in 1892

This vase was a gift to Pasteur from students at the École Normale Supérieure to mark his 70th birthday in 1892.

Emile Gallé engraved a rabid dog, a microscope, microbes, larvae and a quote from Victor Hugo on it.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

Exhibited in the large drawing room of Louis Pasteur's apartment in the Pasteur Museum.

Charity, based on the tomb of General Lamoricière

Bronze sculpture, cast by Ferdinand Barbedienne and sculpted by Paul Dubois (1829-1905) circa 1876.

Museum, large drawing room.
Legal reference: Musée Pasteur

This is one of four allegories positioned at the four corners of General Lamoricière's tomb in Nantes Cathedral.