I have it!

It happened on Friday, 4 February 1983, at 5:45 p.m. A week before, Monsieur Montagnier had come to see me in my laboratory one evening to ask me whether I'd agree to work on an infectious human sample. I agreed straight away. He recommended that I take all possible precautions; at that time we only had a simple laminar flow hood.

Credit: Photo courtesy of Institut Pasteur (magnification × 100,000)

Before turning off the electron microscope, I had to let it cool down. That late Friday afternoon, just as I was about to turn off the cooling water, I saw a virus under the screen. I ran out of the lab, screaming, "I have it, I have it!" Someone walking in the corridor at that moment might have doubted my mental capacities. I immediately took several photos. Time flew by. Later that evening, I arrived at the railway station to take the train to Trouville, where I was planning to spend the weekend, only to see the red taillights of the departing train.

Box 1: Photo courtesy of Institut Pasteur (magnification × 100,000)

I didn't get to the Normandy coast, but that weekend was probably the most intense experience in my 39 years doing electron microscopy at the Pasteur Institute.

After that, I hardly left the electron microscope. It was often tiring, particularly on the eyes—tiring but productive. Examining viral cultures, I saw the virus stick to the cell surface, sometimes disappearing inside, which was a sign of infection. The budding process, a sign of productive infection, was readily visible. And of course, I also saw cells with altered morphology and others killed by the virus.

I was surprised by the appearance of the virus. Viruses with a similar morphology had been described in goats and horses, but nothing like this had ever been described for a human virus. Because I was looking at cells of human origin, I was convinced that we had the first human virus of that family. I remember saying to myself that it would be possible to make a vaccine. I was a bit naive, or at least optimistic, at that moment.

Charlie Dauguet, as told to Hugues Fleury and Simon Wain-Hobson