HeLa cells
HeLa cells make up the largest cell line in the modern world. They are the oldest and most commonly used line of cells in medicine. Since their development, they have served a major function in many medical projects and research. HeLa cells were grown and developed by George Guy and his team of scientists. They grew HeLa cells after obtaining a sample of cervical cancer from a woman named Henrietta Lacks. Henrietta was never aware that her cells were taken and grown, but her cancer cell go out to do amazing things. HeLa revolutionized the medicine world. It led to the development of new vaccines, and it even helped people discover things that they have never knew before. They changed everything, particularly the way research
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In addition, HeLa is very susceptible to many diseases and infections, allowing scientists to examine the effects of various diseases on HeLa. Also, since HeLa cells are just cancer cells, they were used to understand and learn about cancer. There were so many tests performed on HeLa cells. HeLa cells were used to develop the polio vaccine because they could easily be infected with it. In addition, they have also been exposed various diseases such as tuberculosis and salmonella, and they have also been used to determine the effects of toxic substances and radiation. They are used to research cancer, AIDS, HIV, and many other diseases and disorders. HeLa is the perfect researching tool for scientists. They are easy to obtain because they grow so quickly. A few HeLa cells can become thousands within hours or days because they never lose the ability to divide. If Dr. Guy and his team never have been able to develop HeLa, all of the tests performed on HeLa would have been performed on people. The polio vaccine would have been tested on people before it was ready. Scientists would probably have performed horrific cancer and AIDS research on people. Also, some people would have probably been purposely infected with certain diseases. HeLa is the perfect test subject for most scientists because HeLa is a cell line. Because of HeLa, scientists are easily able to obtain cells and conduct research and perform tests on them. Even with HeLa, some scientists still performed unethical human experiments, and this would eventually lead to laws and codes to be put in place that regulate human
Henrietta’s cells were being inaugurated with space travel, infused into rat cells, and even being used to make infertile hens fertile again. However, these are only a few of the many accomplishments that Henrietta’s immortal cells made possible: “The National Cancer Institute was using various cells, including HeLa, to screen more than thirty thousand chemicals and plant extracts, which would yield several of today’s most widely used and effective chemotherapy drugs, including Vincristine and Taxol,”(pg.139). This example of logos from the text again shows just how important these Henrietta’s cells were to the future developments in
The family first heard that Henrietta’s cells were alive and being sent around the world, twenty-two years after Henrietta’s death. After discovering that Henrietta’s cells were in circulation, the family began to blame John Hopkins for taking Henrietta’s cells without permission and commercializing the cells to make multi-million dollar industry, while her family was living in poverty without health insurance. The John Hopkins Hospital has made various statements stating that the hospital never received funds for the HeLa cells specifying that Gey donated all of his HeLa cells samples to fellow researchers. Therefore, the sole benefactors of the HeLa cells profits are the biotechnology companies, which sell vials of HeLa cells for up to ten thousand
Henrietta’s name is associated with HeLa cells after a doctor took her cells without her knowing (the name derives from the first two letters of her first and last names). It is told that George Gey, a cancer researcher at Hopkins was longing to study cancer cells however, the method failed because the cells were studied outside of the body and died. But Henrietta’s cells did not die. In fact they continued to replicate making what we now know as the HeLa cell. The sample of Henrietta’s malignant tumor was offered to researchers who saw the cells continue to multiply in culture, and they still continue to grow up to this day. Scientists remain stumped why the HeLa cells survived whereas others didn't. It has been proposed that the immortality of her cells is due to the enzyme telomerase (Reveron, 2011). Telomerase pre...
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks tells the story of Henrietta Lacks. In the early 1951 Henrietta discovered a hard lump on the left of the entrance of her cervix, after having unexpected vaginal bleeding. She visited the Johns Hopkins hospital in East Baltimore, which was the only hospital in their area where black patients were treated. The gynecologist, Howard Jones, indeed discovers a tumor on her cervix, which he takes a biopsy off to sent it to the lab for diagnosis. In February 1951 Henrietta was called by Dr. Jones to tell about the biopsy results: “Epidermoid carcinoma of the cervix, Stage I”, in other words, she was diagnosed with cervical cancer. Before her first radium treatment, surgeon dr. Wharton removed a sample of her cervix tumor and a sample of her healthy cervix tissue and gave this tissue to dr. George Gey, who had been trying to grow cells in his lab for years. In the meantime that Henrietta was recovering from her first treatment with radium, her cells were growing in George Gey’s lab. This all happened without the permission and the informing of Henrietta Lacks. The cells started growing in a unbelievable fast way, they doubled every 24 hours, Henrietta’s cells didn’t seem to stop growing. Henrietta’s cancer cell grew twenty times as fast as her normal healthy cells, which eventually also died a couple of days after they started growing. The first immortal human cells were grown, which was a big breakthrough in science. The HeLa cells were spread throughout the scientific world. They were used for major breakthroughs in science, for example the developing of the polio vaccine. The HeLa-cells caused a revolution in the scientific world, while Henrietta Lacks, who died Octob...
In 1951, the sickness of a poor African American woman named Henrietta Lacks -also know as HeLa- would go on to change the face of scientific research; without her consent. Henrietta Lacks went into John Hopkins Hospital in hopes of medical treatment, but instead her cells were unlawfully stolen from her and used for scientific advances in the world of medicine for the creations of the polio vaccine, cell cloning, vitro fertilization, and gene mapping. Long after Henrietta's death, Henrietta's family was forced to live a life of poverty without medical insurance simply because they could not afford it although their mothers cells had yielded billions of dollars due to its advances in the medical world. The scientific community and the media
In fact, her family didn’t even know. They received neither payment nor acknowledgment for her uncredited contributions to science. Henrietta’s family were very poor; some lived on the streets and most could not afford proper health care. Meanwhile Dr. Gey and his colleagues were growing rich. Scientists and reporters occasionally inquired about the source of HeLa, but Henrietta Lacks ' name was usually attributed to the fictitious "Helen Lane”, "Helen Larson" or "Henrietta Lakes." This book gives credit to Henrietta and her family for their great contributions to science. The author is the innovator who dug up this story and made sure Henrietta is given the recognition she
..., the name of Henrietta Lacks needs to be introduced to the world since she is the woman who generated HeLa cells, because the name of the person who generated HeLa cells is still unknown. By doing this, her family will be honored and respected by others.
HeLa cells were one of the greatest medical inventions that came about for the scientific field and yet the woman behind this medical feat is not fully remembered and honored. Her cells and tissue were taken away from her without consent and more than that, she was exploited for being black and not questioning what the doctor was doing. Her family suffered through countless years of agonizing pain in which they were misinformed about where and what her cells were being used for. Yes, HeLa cells changed the way we view medicine today, but only at the cost of creating one of the greatest controversies of owning ones body.
As I looked up recent articles about the HeLa cells I find that her cells still exist today and are being used for genome sequencing (Nature.com). Doctors are using the same cells from over 50 years ago to better our medicine and medical advances. I wonder what Henrietta thinks of all this. It is an amazing thing in the long run because of what we discovered, but it is truly a terrible thing because it was done without consent and she had no choice. This also caused a lot of pain for her family and if only this could have been done on someone who consented and agreed, maybe it would not be such a negative event in history.
The first time, the author, Rebecca Skloot heard of Henrietta Lacks was during a biology class at a community college. "Everybody learns about these cells in basic biology, but what was unique about my situation was that my teacher actually knew Henrietta’s real name and that she was black" (Zielinski). This first initial encounter would begin the search for the unknown story behind the real woman, whose name no one had really heard of. Henrietta had cancerous cells taken from her that would be known as HeLa cells in science literature; the first human cells to reliably and proliferately be produced in a laboratory. These cells became one of the crucial research materials for health and genetic science studies (such as developing the polio vaccine, cloning. and gene mapping), the foundation of medical research and scientific discoveries worldwide. They were also the impotence to a great deal of controversy due to them being taken without the knowledge or consent of the donor or her family; "enduring nearly 60 years of anguish directly related to the success of the Hela cell line" as stated in a review by Norman Fost (87). He brought light to
In the 1960s the HeLa cells were everywhere. In the 1960s the scientist wondered since the cells grew so fast and lived on earth so well if they would live in space. They got the idea to send the Hela cells to space. They sent several vials into space by the Discoverer XVII when it went. They discovered that when the HeLa cells went to space they became more powerful and divided faster every time they went to space. Several years later in 1965 they took equal amounts from the HeLa cells and cells from a mouse. The scientists done this to study to see what the genes would do. Harris also took HeLa cells and chicken cells, but they discovered they couldn’t reproduce.
later in the passage. In the article, “ The Good, the Bad, and the HeLa”, Alexandra del Carpio, who has a PhD in chemical engineering from the University of California states that this led to her cells “being the first immortal cell line cultured by scientists”, specifically a scientist named George Gey (“The Good, the Bad, and the HeLa”). Gey is the researcher at Johns Hopkins University who took the cell sample from Henrietta Lacks and is a world renowned scientist, famous for creating the first cells of HeLa. From his perspective, all that mattered were the cells. He didn’t focus on the woman behind them, or what injustice would happen to her and her family. As a researcher, his main goal was to find a cure for cancer.
In The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, multiple cell research studies involving Henrietta’s cells are described. Author Rebecca Skloot writes about Henrietta Lacks’ journey through her cervical cancer and how her cells changed the lives of millions long after her death. Skloot relates the history of cell research, including those studies which were successful and those that were not so successful. It is necessary for the author to include the achievements and disturbing practices of scientists throughout this history to inform readers and focus on the way Henrietta’s cells were used. Truth always matters to readers and Henrietta’s family deserves the truth.
It was her cells that became what is known as HELA cells or immortal cells. Her story is interesting to me because of her impact on the science community. Her cells allowed scientist to perform
In conclusion, the Henrietta Lacks cells have lived longer outside of her body than actually in it. Henrietta went from a small farm in Virginia with little education, to battling cervical cancer, and going on to change how we look at science in her short life. There are many areas of her life and legacy that I could have gone into today such as race discrimination, moral ethics, and patients’ rights but I have chosen to just give a overview on the facts surrounding her . Today, there is much acclaim for a woman who will never know the impact she had had on science. Her family is aware however and is working to make sure that the world knows about Henrietta Lacks. While her life may have been short her death may have changed the course of science. So again, can your cells change medical history? The answer now should be maybe.