Hela Cells Research Paper

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is a novel written by Rabecca Skloot that outlines the life and story of a woman named Henrietta Lacks and her families struggle to discover the truth. Henrietta Lacks was and African American women who was diagnosed with cervical cancer at the age of thirty. A doctor at John Hopkins Hospital examined Henrietta and a biopsy of the cancerous tissue was retrieved. Henrietta received treatment for her cancer, but the cancer was too aggressive and she soon passed away at age of thirty-one, but her cells continue to live today. Henrietta Lack’s cells were unlike any other humans cells ever examined. The cells were able to grow, multiply, and divide outside of the human body in a lab (Skloot 2010). This was a major scientific discovery. Henrietta’s cells, more commonly known to the public as HeLa, aided in the creation of several scientific discoveries and are still used today. It is because of HeLa we have the polio vaccine, a better understanding of cancer, and cells in general. The cells have even been sent into space and have been exposed to nuclear testing and to toxins (BigPicture). Although Henrietta Lacks’s cells have done a lot good, many ethical issues surround her case such as privacy issues, monetary compensation, exploitation, and cell contamination to name a few. Perhaps the most important and controversial ethical issue in Hennrietta’s case resides around consent, or the lack there of.

Due to the fact that Henrietta’s cells were the first human cells grown in a lab that did not die after a few cell divisions, they could be used for conducting many experiments. Her cells were considered “immortal”. This was a major breakthrough in medical and biological research. One major breakthrough was the development of a vaccine for polio. To test the vaccine the cells were quickly put into mass production in the first-ever cell production factory. Another enormous breakthrough was the successful cloning of human cells in 1955. Demand for the HeLa cells grew quickly. Since they were put into mass production, Henrietta’s cells have been mailed to scientists around the globe from “research into cancer, AIDS, the effects of radiation and toxic substances, gene mapping, and countless other scientific pursuits.” (Smith, 2002, "Wonder Woman: The Life, Death, and Life After Death of Henrietta Lacks, Unwitting Heroine of Modern Medical Science".) HeLa cells have been used to test human sensitivity to tape, glue, cosmetics, and many other products. Scientists have grown some 20 tons of her cells, and there are almost 11,000 patents involving HeLa cells. (Batts, 2010)

HeLa simply stands for Henrietta Lacks, a young mother in the 1951 who went to the doctor complaining of vaginal bleeding and discovered she had cervical cancer. Henrietta’s cells were taken for a biopsy and were found to be like nothing ever seen before; her cells were immortal. Her cancer cells double every 20 to 24 hours and have lived on for the past 60 years. Since HeLa cells were created, our world of modern medicine has been completely changed. We now vaccines for once incurable diseases and have used the cells for cloning and other biomedical research. Although the cells have done a great deal of good,

This book kept me drawing conclusions and I could think of the good and bad too most of it. “But Henrietta’s cells weren’t early surveying, they were growing with mythological intensity…Soon, George told a few of his closest colleagues that he thought his ab might have grown the first immortal human cells. To which they replied, Can I have some? And George said yes” (40.5). Skloot gives an insight to the secret ‘deal’ between the doctors to emphasize her point, once again, that taking cells were okay at the time without consent from the patient. The audience sees and irony here as they read about Gey’s answer to his colleagues question, can I have some, as a yes. Even though Gey doesn’t own the cells, he is giving other people Henrietta’s cells as if it is his. Henrietta, herself, is not asked the question, before Gey took away her cells without asking her. “Not lont after Henrietta’s death, planning began for a HeLa factory- a massive operation that would grow to produce trillions of HeLa cells each week. It was built for one reason: to help stop polio”(93.1). This setting shows the inhumanity that had went on in the 1900’s. Henrietta’s death was considered to be nothing at all. Henrietta’s cells were the only ones that were welcomed and meaningful, who and where that they came from didn’t matter, HeLa cells were widely spread and praised for its immortality, but Henrietta was not. She probably lived through

The topic of Henrietta Lacks and what her cells did for science is very well known. Henrietta Lacks is an African-American women who developed cervical cancer that spread throughout her body. Information gathered by Rebecca Skloot and many other researchers suggests that scientists took a sample of Henrietta’s cancerous cells without her permission. These HeLa cells were the first successful group of cells to stay alive outside of a living body, and continued on to help the world of medicine in many ways.

Henrietta was bleeding abnormally. Her husband took her to John Hopkins hospital. Henrietta was diagnosed with cervical cancer, but they had never seen something like hers. Sadly, Henrietta died but John Hopkins Hospital discovered her cells multiplied twice, every 24 hours. Medicine has changed forever ever since her mortal cells were discovered. Her cells were sent out to different places around the U.S Europe, Asia, and India. Her cells helped develop the polio vaccines, they were able to run many neutralization tests on her cells. For 30 years they had been in search of cells that lived outside of the human body, and they had finally made it. Scientists were able to clone her cells. The cells helped them gain information on how viruses attacked human cells. Her cells were also used to see how steroids worked for chemotherapy and tuberculosis. They were so amazed by her cells that they thought they had found the cure to cancer. Her family found out about their mother’s cells in 1976 when her story was published in a Rolling Stone magazine with her real name. HELA is the name they gave her cells short for Henrietta Lacks. HELA cells became very efficient for many different uses in all. Today, HELA cells have saved many people

In the book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot writes about Henrietta’s life and how her cells were taken for medical research. The book progresses by identifying how the medical breakthroughs and the realization that their mother’s cells were taken and experimented on impacted her family, the people around her, and the medical world. Skloot describes the vast amount of medical conditions that Henrietta’s cells, or HeLa cells, have improved or cured, yet the source of the cells is unknown. Henrietta’s personal identity was not associated with the cells. Skloot recalls an incident where biologist George Gey received Henrietta’s cells for research.

In the novel “The Immortal life of Henrietta Lacks” we explore into the world of HeLa cells and the woman behind these cells that created the medial revolution and multi million-dollar industry. Henrietta Lacks was a poor black tobacco farmer who went to the doctors for a knot she felt in her womb and had her cells taken from her that turned out to be extremely important but what came with the medical revolution was the controversial issue of race and poverty that stricken Henrietta Lacks and her family and how her or her family any received any money from these medical revolution using her cells before and after her death many years

Henrietta finally went to the doctor because she thought she had no choice after having a feeling for almost a year that something was not right(Skloot 14). She visited John Hopkins Hospital and was tended to by a Physician whose name was Howard Jones. He quickly diagnosed her with cervical cancer. All of the tests that Henrietta took revealed that she suffered from syphilis, gonorrhea, and the hpv virus(Skloot). These were a result of her husband having sex with a lot of different women. During a biopsy to help try to beat her cancer the hospital took a tissue sample from her cervix for testing. Doctor George Gey had been testing on cells unsuccessfully for 20 years trying to keep them alive and duplicate them outside of the body. When they tested Henrietta's cells they somehow did not die after a couple days but kept duplicating. This made Henrietta's cells the first immortal cell line ever by a human(5 reasons). The breakthrough of this cell line was one of the biggest scientific breakthroughs in a long time. Henrietta's cells were and are now called Hela cells. The definition of this is “a cancerous cell belonging to a strain continuously cultured since its isolation in 1951 from a patient suffering from cervical carcinoma. The designation HeLa is derived from the name of the patient, Henrietta Lacks. HeLa cells were the

He is convinced to allow the autopsy and Dr. Gey’s assistant, Mary, is able to have samples of tissues taken from all parts of Henrietta’s body. When Mary sees Henrietta’s polished toenails, she is struck at how she is now thinking of Henrietta as a person instead of just a specimen. After testing the cells removed during the autopsy, it is decided that HeLa will be mass produced in hopes that scientists can find a cure for polio. Dr. Salk has developed a vaccine and the HeLa cells can now be used to test out his theory. HeLa cells were being sent everywhere by train, plane and truck to anyone who wanted to use them. Dr. Gey shared his growing culture recipe and his auto stir invention with his colleagues. Advances in DNA, human genetics, in vitro fertilization, stem cells and cloning all came as a result of HeLa cells.

Mary Kubicek went through the same procedure with Henrietta’s cells as she had done with hundreds before, writing HeLa on each of the vials of cells in culture. At the time, she was just taking the first two letters of Henrietta Lacks’ first and last names to make a short form, as was done with all of the other cells. Little did she know that the name she just wrote (HeLa) would soon be a common word in laboratories around the world. The Gey laboratory had been trying for years to get human cells to reproduce outside of the body, but most cells that they worked on died quickly and the few that didn’t, hardly grew at all. Some hours after placing the cells into the vials, Mary returned to check on them, not expecting anything to have happened, as had been the case hundreds of times before. When she looked in the vials, the cells had grown and started to reproduce, so she had to move some into new vials to let the cells have more room to grow. She told George Gey, but he didn’t want to get very excited since they still could die any minute. But the HeLa cells continued to grow, reproducing an entire generation every 24 hours, and they never

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is a book like a timeline going first her biography, then her childhood to her tragic death; the story of her family over various decades; Skloot’s research and her relationship with the Lacks family, especially Deborah; and the story of the HeLa cells. Tells an interesting story of a clash between race, ethics, and medicine; about a daughter overwhelm with questions about the mother she never knew. Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa was a poor black tobacco farmer whose cells were taken without her knowledge in 1951 and they became one of the most important tools in medicine. They were essential for developing the polio vaccine, cloning, gene mapping, in vitro fertilization, and more. A doctor

The book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, was a nonfiction story about the life of Henrietta Lacks, who died of cervical cancer in 1951. Henrietta did not know that her doctor took a sample of her cancer cells a few months before she died. “Henrietta cells that called HeLa were the first immortal human cells ever grown in a laboratory” (Skloot 22). In fact, the cells from her cervix are the most important advances in medical research. Rebecca was interested to write this story because she was anxious with the story of HeLa cells. When she was in biology class, her professor named Donald Defler gave a lecture about cells. Defler tells the story about Henrietta Lacks and HeLa cells. However, the professor ended his

In chapter 17, we learn about how in the 1950's Chester Southam wondered if the cancerous HeLa cells

I am writing this letter to you to help you understand the importance of including HeLa cells in your biology book. First of all, some teachers may know her real name and that she is African American but nothing else. However, there is a very interesting story behind HeLa cells that have made a difference in our lives, and our parent’s lives. It was originally developed for cancer research but it has also been sent to outer space to see if the cells could live there,