*editing to make this fair* I was a material science engineering major with a biomedical engineering minor, intending to pursue a graduate degree in biomedical/cell research... I learned about her in a class.
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You become free from who you have become, by becoming who you were meant to be. ~Mark from another forum I post on
God did it for us. Out of sheer generosity he put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we're in and restored us to where he always wanted us to be. And he did it by means of Jesus Christ. ~Romans 3:24 from The Message
Wow, my mind just boggles about things we never know till someone
shares it..and how much more there is out there that we just dont
know now., but might., in mere seconds., its good to be sane, ain't it?
__________________ You can tell more about people
by what they say about others...than by what others
say about them.
HeLa cells are mentioned all the time in biological research. One thing to keep in mind, though this article keeps saying these were Henrietta's cells, these are the cancer cells that killed Henrietta Lacks.
They are not "normal" or healthy human tissue. They are cancerous and killed the original host (Mrs. Lacks).
The thing that I've wondered about this: Since cervical cancer is so often caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV or "pap virus") was Henrietta's cancer caused by this? Also, what were the characteristics the the virus' own DNA (if it was HPV)?
What can we possibly learn about cell mortality and/or longevity from the study of the HPV virus (or whatever virus may have caused her cancer)? This assumes that this case of cervical cancer was caused by a virus. HPV exists within the DNA of different bacteria as well. Also, there are other causes of cervical cancer.
But whatever "bug" caused the death of Henrietta Lacks is an interesting "bug" indeed.