text: Cisplatin, a platinum-based compound, was discovered by a Michigan State University researcher, Barnett Rosenberg, working under an NCI contract. This was yet another serendipitous discovery: Rosenberg had initially wanted to explore the possible effects of an electric field on the growth of bacteria. He observed that the bacteria unexpectedly ceased to divide when placed in an electric field. Excited, he spent months of testing to try to explain this phenomenon. He was disappointed to find that the cause was an experimental artifact — the inhibition of bacterial division was pinpointed to an electrolysis product of the platinum electrode rather than the electrical field. This accidental discovery, however, soon initiated a series of investigations and studies into the effects of platinum compounds on cell division, culminating in the synthesis of cisplatin. This drug was pivotal in the cure of testicular cancer. Subsequently, Eve Wiltshaw and others at the Institute of Cancer Research in the United Kingdom extended the clinical usefulness of the platinum compounds with their development of carboplatin, a cisplatin derivative with broad antitumour activity and comparatively less nephrotoxicity.