More than 125 years after its foundation (*), the Pasteur Institute is still one of the world’s largest, best known and most powerful biomedical research institutions 1. The original motherhouse was founded by Louis Pasteur in 1888 thanks to the funds and facilities generously provided by the Paris municipality and the French state and also to the donations of voluntary contributors from France and the most disparate corners of the globe 2. Before the great savant died seven years later, official branches had already been opened in Saigon, Lille, Tunis, Algiers, Sydney and Nha-Trang, not to speak about many others which had adopted the trademark without having a formal connection to the Parisian headquarters, such as those in Rio de Janeiro, New York, Chicago or Istanbul. During the first quarter of the 20th century, new official institutes were established in various French colonies and protectorates as well as in countries with significant economic, political or cultural links with France such as Brazil, Greece, Romania, the Soviet Union, and Iran. Today, the so-called Institut Pasteur International Network comprises 32 centers in the five continents 3.

This paper has been written within the frame of UID/HIS/00057/2013 (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007702) – FCT, COMPETE, FEDER, Portugal2020 and also with the support of an Investigator contract of the Fundaçao para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) of Portugal and of the FCT project IF/00835/2014CP1232/CT0002.

UID/HIS/00057/2013 (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007702) – FCT, COMPETE, FEDER, Portugal2020

FCT project IF/00835/2014CP1232/CT0002