Cell line: HeLa Cells
Cell type: Human cervix carcinoma
Origin: Taken from cervix carcinoma of a 31 year Henrietta Lacks in 1951
Morphology: Epithelial-like cells growing in monolayers

Showing posts with label Henrietta Lacks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Henrietta Lacks. Show all posts

Life of Henrietta Lacks

Henrietta Lacks was an African American woman who lived in the early 1900s. She was born in 1920 in Roanoke, Virginia, and grew up on a tobacco farm nearby Clover, Virginia. Lacks was the daughter of a farmer and a homemaker, and she had several siblings. She married at a young age and had five children. Little is known about her early life, but she later married her cousin, David Lacks, and the couple had five children together.

Henrietta Lacks, HeLa Cells, and Cell Culture Contamination

The Immortal Life of Henrietta LacksHenrietta Lacks died in 1951 of an aggressive adenocarcinoma of the cervix. A tissue biopsy obtained for diagnostic evaluation yielded additional tissue for Dr George O. Gey's tissue culture laboratory at Johns Hopkins (Baltimore, Maryland). The cancer cells, now called HeLa cells, grew rapidly in cell culture and became the first human cell line. HeLa cells were used by researchers around the world. However, 20 years after Henrietta Lacks' death, mounting evidence suggested that HeLa cells contaminated and overgrew other cell lines. Cultures, supposedly of tissues such as breast cancer or mouse, proved to be HeLa cells. We describe the history behind the development of HeLa cells, including the first published description of Ms Lacks' autopsy, and the cell culture contamination that resulted. The debate over cell culture contamination began in the 1970s and was not harmonious. Ultimately, the problem was not resolved and it continues today. Finally, we discuss the philosophical implications of the immortal HeLa cell line.

Reference and rest of the article: Lucey BP, Nelson-Rees WA, Hutchins GM. 2009. Henrietta Lacks, HeLa cells, and cell culture contamination.Arch Pathol Lab Med. 133(9):1463-7

Story of HeLa cells

The entire story of Hela cells and the Henrietta Lacks.

Henrietta Lacks: The Miracle Woman

When Henrietta Lacks was diagnosed with cancer in 1951, doctors took her cells and grew them in test tubes. Those cells led to breakthroughs in everything from Parkinson's to polio. But today, Henrietta is all but forgotten. In an excerpt from her book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot tells her story.


In 1951, at the age of 30, Henrietta Lacks, the descendant of freed slaves, was diagnosed with cervical cancer—a strangely aggressive type, unlike any her doctor had ever seen. He took a small tissue sample without her knowledge or consent. A scientist put that sample into a test tube, and, though Henrietta died eight months later, her cells—known worldwide as HeLa—are still alive today. They became the first immortal human cell line ever grown in culture and one of the most important tools in medicine: Research on HeLa was vital to the development of the polio vaccine, as well as drugs for treating herpes, leukemia, influenza, hemophilia, and Parkinson's disease; it helped uncover the secrets of cancer and the effects of the atom bomb, and led to important advances like cloning, in vitro fertilization, and gene mapping. Since 2001 alone, five Nobel Prizes have been awarded for research involving HeLa cells.

Read the rest of the excerpt on Hela cells and Henrietta Lacks.

Who was Henrietta Lacks

Not long before her death, Henrietta Lacks danced. As the film rolled, her long thin face teased the camera, flashing a seductive grin as she moved, her eyes locked on the lens. She tilted her head back and raised her hands, waving them softly in the air before letting them fall to smooth her curlers. Then the film went blank.

Henrietta danced in Turners Station, a small, segregated Baltimore community where she moved in 1943. She had come by train from a plantation town in Virginia, leaving her kin behind, most still picking tobacco long after freedom from slavery. As she sped toward Baltimore, at the age of 23, her husband, David Lacks, waited in their new brick house with a stove that burned gas instead of wood. Henrietta knew she was heading into a more modern world. What she didn't know was that less than a decade later, after giving birth to her fifth child, her womb would give rise to a new age in medicine.
More on Henrietta Lacks.

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