BASSI, AGOSTINO. – A lawyer by profession and a naturalist by vocation, born in Mairago (Lodi) in 1773, died in Lodi in 1856. Studying calcino, or “mal del segno,” in silkworms, he attributed it to a fungus (named in his honor Botrytis bassiana), thus inaugurating, in 1835, the era of bacteriological discoveries and opening the way to the doctrine of pathogenic microorganisms (the agent of contagion is a living being). He should be regarded as one of the great naturalists of the nineteenth century and perhaps as the most original. A man of profound piety, B. frequently attributes the merit of his discoveries to Providence in his writings.
Among his writings, the following deserves mention: Mal del segno, Calcinaccio o moscardino, malattia che affligge i bachi da seta (Lodi 1835–36).