Category: Science: Medicine

Copyright/published Year: 2011 by Broadway Paperbacks

ISBN: 1400052181

Binding: trade pap

Description: Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. ì She was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same land ì as her slave ancestors, yet her cells-taken without her ì knowledge-became one of the most important tools in medicine: The ì first "immortal" human cells grown in culture, which are still ì alive today, though she has been dead for more than sixty years. ì HeLa cells were vital for developing the polio vaccine; uncovered ì secrets of cancer, viruses, and the atom bomb's effects; helped ì lead to important advances like in vitro fertilization, cloning, ì and gene mapping; and have been bought and sold by the ì billions.

Yet Henrietta Lacks remains virtually unknown, buried in an ì unmarked grave.

Henrietta's family did not learn of her "immortality" until ì more than twenty years after her death, when scientists ì investigating HeLa began using her husband and children in ì research without informed consent. And though the cells had ì launched a multimillion-dollar industry that sells human ì biological materials, her family never saw any of the profits. As ì Rebecca Skloot so brilliantly shows, the story of the Lacks ì family-past and present-is inextricably connected to the dark ì history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of ì bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the ì stuff we are made of.

Condition Information

This is a used book and is in Good condition.

Additional condition description

Clean and unmarked copy.