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Note to self (or anyone else having the time to incorporate it): the cell line is regarded as a new species, called Helacyton Gartleri. [1] [2] arj 15:51, 10 May 2004 (UTC)
- If anyone does add this, be careful with the uppercase: it seems to be Helacyton gartleri, or at least that s what google has, and what s on the HeLa cell article. PaulDehaye 10:13, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
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- That's standard binomial name form: Genus species. --FOo 07:24, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
Change devolution to evolution. There is no such thing as devolution. See: devolution
Helacyton gartleri
Helacyton gartleri is thought of by some an example of the creation of a new species. The cells were transformed by infection with HPV and are replicating without the hayflick limit of most eucaryotic animal cells. They have a different chromosome number from human cells, and are genetically stable, but still evolving. The same could be said for other immortal cell lines that are chromosomally stable, and no longer have the same number of chromosomes of humans. Another example may be the infectious cancer cells found in Tasmanian devil that can be transmitted through bites. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 21:41, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
Moved as POV
There is controversy, however, concerning the use of her cells without her permission, particularly since she was an African-American woman, a historically disempowered group in the United States (especially during the 1950s).
GA Promotion, March 4 2007
I'm passing the GA nomination for this article because it meets all of the good article criteria (not to mention being extremely interesting!). I wish I had comments as to how to improve this article, but other than expansion I can't really think of anything, and that in itself may be difficult as when she was alive nobody appeared to know about her (well at least not enough to bother writing a biography). Anyway, good work :) Veesicle (Talk) (Contribs) 02:02, 4 March 2007 (UTC)
Date of Birth?
The article says "August 18, 1920". The box below the picture says "October 20, 1911". --Robert Stevens 16:13, 8 March 2007 (UTC)
- The article still says August 18, 1920 (which appears to be the most common date given elsewhere on the web, but that may be an echo of this article) -- but the box now says August 8, 1920. I'm going to unify as the 18th with a (?). Gojomo (talk) 22:08, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
Date of death?
Along the same lines of the previous post, has anyone else noticed that the approximate date of the picture is 1945-50, but her date of death is 1940? I'd fix it, but not sure what exactly to fix it to....Banpei 00:59, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
Children?
Same lines again -the article says she had 5 children, but only four names are given in the box below the picture
I would also like to add that the article stats "Eliza died giving birth to her tenth child in 1924", but later on in the article is states that she only had 5 children and died from a medical condition which was believed to be cervical cancer (in stark contrast to the original claim of death by child-birth). So which is correct? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.74.129.241 (talk) 21:26, August 24, 2007 (UTC)
Tumorigenesis is not (ever) an evolutionary process?
As of July 20, 2007, this article recites in part, “With near unanimity, evolutionary scientists and biologists hold that a chimeric human cell line is not a distinct species, and that tumorigenesis is not an evolutionary process.” However, I could not find support for this assertion in the cited reference. Moreover, the assertion of this sentence seems to be contradicted by the hypothesized origins of at least two transmissible cancers:
- Devil facial tumor disease (DFTD) is a transmittable parasitic cancer of the Tasmanian Devil, first described in the scientific literature in 1995; and
- Canine transmissible venereal tumor (CTVT) is a sexually transmitted cancer among dogs, of which a single malignant clone of CTVT cells has colonized infected dogs worldwide—it represents the oldest known malignant cell line in continuous propagation.
For this reason, I am rewriting this sentence to omit the assertion that tumorigenesis is not regarded as an evolutionary process. --Ryanaxp 21:32, 21 July 2007 (UTC)
- Neither of the specified theories calls anything an "evolutionary process". - Nunh-huh 02:28, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
- I agree. Nonetheless, the above-noted sentence still finds no support in its original form, either. Further to this, while I also agree that "evolutionary process" is a poor descriptor, still, it seems that at least some somatic tumors may have in fact given rise to the parasitic cancers, DFTD and CTVT—i.e., tumorigenesis did lead at least to "speciation," which falls within the realm of an "evolutionary process" (no original research, yadda yadda yadda, notwithstanding). --Ryanaxp 15:31, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
- While the material on the above diseases might not have included the specific phrase "evolutionary process," I think it seems obvious that infectious agents like these are under the same evolutionary pressures as any other. I think if you can imagine rabies is subject to the pressures of natural selection, then these must be too. They aren't magically exempt because they came from malignant tumors.
- However, if you need to see the exact words in your source, then I'd refer you to the source provided for the April 11, 2008 edit by 168.7.245.220. The section in the book is entitled "Cancer as a Microevolutionary process" (and includes the subsection "Tumor Progression Involves Successive Rounds of Mutation and Natural Selection"). And this is in Molecular Biology of the Cell by Alberts et. al, one of the most widely used (and thus scientifically accepted) cell biology textbooks. Based on such definitive statements from such a reliable source, I'm removing the statement again.Qwerty0 (talk) 13:22, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
- Unfortunately, that source has nothing to do with "Helacyton gartleri":it discusses cancer in general. If one uses it to "prove" that "Helacyton gartleri" is a species, one may also use it to "prove" that lung cancer is a species. In short, it doesn't say what the person who cited it thought it did. It simply makes the unremarkable claim that cancer cells compete. - Nunh-huh 23:50, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
Biography?
This article no longer seems to be a biography but a tribute. The HeLa and Legacy sections now comprise the majority of this article's bulk which should not be the case: HeLa has its own article and the Legacy should be a quick summary of official or widely recognized honors. We do not really need to explain the reasoning for such honors because they are often verbose and, all too often, revisionist. In particular, to suggest that Lacks or her family made sacrifices or contributions to science is being nice but not honest and certainly not NPOV. What a biography is supposed to be is about the person's life. Another article with the same kinds of issues is the Terri Schiavo article: a "notable patient" whose importance was not recognized until after the onset of her brain damage. Maybe an RFC that includes those two and Rosalind Franklin would be good approach because Franklin also suffers from being a significant contributor to science who died too young, as compared to say, Marie Curie. An aid to achieving genuine NPOV is to state "just the facts" of what these people did and drain away the emotion that impels us to want make martyrs of them. We really need some guidelines about balance between NPOV fact and uniformity between these and other biographies.
The HeLa section does not have to establish the importance of HeLa, it should be restricted only to how it related to Lacks. Contrasting "mortality vs. immortality" is trite; it should only deal with how there was
- No permission or knowledge, which was and is legal
- How Lacks' name was released
In the current version, we are told about five time about how quickly the cells grow. That is repetitive: we only need to be told that it grew quickly in her and it grows quickly in the petri dish. How is the "(anthropomorphic) phrases increased in the narratives" a fact? It is just an insinuation of soft racism and sexism.--Tonycointoss 23:39, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
- It is important to remember that a biography is about a person. The HeLa cultures are not the person of Lacks, even if they eventually lead to clones of her. From the moment the tumor/samples are removed, they cease to be an important part of the biography.--75.37.14.196 (talk) 10:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Cleanup Tag
Refers specifically to the sections "Early Life" and "Later Life." The paragraph structure is very confusing. Additionally, the part about John marrying a thirteen-year-old seems somewhat irrelevant. --aciel 20:09, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
- This article needs to be greatly improved to meet current standards for GA. It needs to be copy-edited for prose. The references need to be in one consistent style. Some information, as noted above, is unnecessary. Please consider making these changes. I may help in the coming days, but I'd prefer to not be the only one working on it. Lara❤Love 15:24, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
African-American?
Is she an African-American? If so, I think it should be stated clearly in the article. sentausa (talk) 03:14, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
I think there was a wave of removing ethnic tags on people a while ago. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 03:16, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
- But if it's not stated clearly, Hannah Landecker's discussions will be confusing. So, is she an African-American or not? I still don't know for sure. sentausa (talk) 03:52, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
-
- She was black. She died in a segregated hospital ward for blacks. Like most American blacks, the question is more interesting than "black-or-white". See <http://www.citypaper.com/news/story.asp?id=3426> - Nunh-huh 03:55, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
Essay
I have moved the following essay from the biography. It is a hybrid of information on the cell line and on her, and doesn't fit in cleanly with the chronological order in her biography. It has the style of a personal stand alone essay. Any suggestions? --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 01:52, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
HeLa's immortality and Lacks' mortality
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This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please improve this article if you can. (November 2007) |
The HeLa cells or cell line is immortal. Today, HeLa cells are commonly used in research laboratories as a model for human cells.[1][2] Since HeLa was cultivated to live outside the human body, this cell line has since been used in thousands of experiments, contributing to the understanding of disease processes. In the past HeLa was used in Jonas Salk's development of the polio vaccine.
Mrs. Lacks was the human source of HeLa cell line and of this cell line's name. The word "HeLa" was devised by Gey by using the first two letters of Lacks' first and last names to keep her real name a secret. This worked for a while, leading some to think the human source of HeLa was "Harriet Lane", "Helen Lane", and others.[3][4]
Various accounts on HeLa and Mrs. Henrietta Lacks differ over why and how she died, over whether or not (1) her cancer was metastasizing at an abnormal rate, faster than any other cancer; (2) whether she or her her husband were asked about the cultivation of her cells, or the future use of them; (3) over how her husband and her children were treated by physicians, researchers, scientists and science writers after her death, especially when the family members, now all past the age of twenty, were told that a sample of the cells could be studied to isolate genetic factors and to prevent cancer deaths in future generations; and (4) when her husband and her children actually learned about HeLa and the research using HeLa, and related issues involving the family's loss of privacy and anonymity.
When it came to informing Lacks or her husband (three of her five children were under the age of five years old) of the potential use of the cells, then as now there was no necessity to inform or ask for consent from a patient or relatives because discarded material, or material obtained during surgery, diagnosis or therapy, was and is the property of the physician or medical institution. Years later, this was the decision of the Supreme Court of California in the case of John Moore vs. the Regents of the University of California. The court ruled that a person's discarded tissue and cells are not his or her property and can be commercialized without permission or recompense.
In the 1971 article cited above, it was reported that Mrs. Lacks was misdiagnosed with the slower-metastasizing epidermoid carcinoma, when in reality she had adenocarcinoma, a fast-metastasizing cancer. The article reported on this discovery, how they discovered this misdiagnosis, and stated further that researchers may in the future discover what Gey had thought he discovered nearly twenty years. Some articles say that the HeLa cell line was originally cultured due to its tremendous proliferation rate, abnormally rapid even compared to other cancer cells. It is stated that it was this remarkably speedy proliferation which sealed Henrietta Lacks' fate. This misdiagnosis, it is said, would not have affected her chances of survival by the oncological standards of the day, her cancer being so fast-moving..[1] Other authors point to a general inattention to the report of a misdiagnosis.
According to anthropologist Hannah Landecker in Culturing Life: How Cells Became Technologies (2007),[5] in "Between Beneficence and Chattel: The Human Biological in Law and Science" in Science in Context (1999), and in a chapter of Biotechnology and Culture: Bodies, Anxieties, Ethics (2000),[6] narratives on Mrs. Lacks and HeLa have changed over time. In the earlier 1950's narratives, Lacks was portrayed as the "angelic", "beneficent", "heroic" and "self-sacrificing" donor of HeLa, which was considered to be a "standard" or a "universal", and Mrs. Lacks was "assumed to be white". (2000,64)
After 1966, argues Landecker, when it was found that HeLa was contaminating other cell lines (2007, 171), and after her gender and race were also confirmed, the following adjectives, nouns, and phrases increased in the narratives: "voracious","vigorous", "aggressive", "malicious", "male-volent", "malignant", "surreptitious", "indefatigable", "renegade", "catastropic", "luxuriant", "undeflatable", "contaminating", "promiscuity", "wild proliferative tendencies," "colorful laboratory life", and even "a monster among the Pyrex". Some wrote about "world domination by HeLa" or about "HeLa taking over the world." Landecker, in addition, writes about narratives that "took on a racial grammar of miscegenation and heredity pollution" and that depicted HeLa cells as "racialized threats to scientific order".
In the 1980s and 1990s, according to Landecker, economic and monetary considerations began to be stressed, and there was a focus on "economic injustice", "economic exploitation", economic value, and "economic power and privilege". In the last instance, the poverty or educational levels of those at Johns Hopkins or such institutions is contrasted to the wealth, or educational level of the members of the Lacks' family. Three conventions, however, persist in these narratives: inclinations (1) to emphasize HeLa's immortality; (2), to "obscure" (2007, 171) and "mask" (2007,64) Lacks' death or misdiagnosis; and (3), to use her photographs, "as was the case" with the tissue from a biopsy as well, "without any indication that permission was sought or given for its use, either from Lacks or her family". (2000, fn 61,264).
Landecker states that "Although it is difficult to say whether an accurate diagnosis of adenocarcinoma would have helped in Lack's treatment", what was evident to her was a "total absence of questioning of the circumstances and adequacy of her medical treatment --- even with the clearly stated admission of misdiagnostic error published in 1971" among scientists and journalists. To Landecker this "absence of questioning ... indicates the power of the concepts of immortality produced by the life of these cells." The "death of a person who was Henrietta Lacks has been obscured by the personification of her cells as an immortal entity".(2000,55)
The identification of HeLa has not just revealed the death of a specific human being, it has also focussed attention on the interactions between this and other American families with science writers and the media in general; with researchers, whether those in the social and natural sciences or the humanities; with scientists, including social scientists and government officials, including the military. Questions have also been raised regarding the education of Americans vis-a-vis the storage and use of human genetic material, including research and legislation issues. Public education on the subject has been recommended, but no measures have been implemented.
The problem as outlined by Landecker can be viewed as part of a larger issue identified by science writer Michael Gold that has yet to be addressed. Neither Henrietta Lacks nor HeLa is the main subject of Gold's Conspiracy of Cells: One Woman's Immortal Legacy and the Medical Scandal It Caused. He focuses most of his attention on Nelson Rees and his many, and probably career-ending, efforts to identify the contamination, which was occurring in the best medical and research institutions in the USA and abroad, and in the laboratories of the best physicians, scientists, and researchers, including Jonas Salk, as a problem that he named HeLa. He did not, however, mention an occurrence of a HeLa contamination problem in the laboratories run by either Rees himself or by Gey and his wife, nurse Margaret Gey. Gold states that this problem almost led to a cold war incident. Gold's concern was how much time, money and energy had been wasted in the war against cancer, not so much because of a HeLa contamination problem, but because of a problem he and others called "HeLa".
In his epilogue, Gold writes about the contamination problem: "There is more to the problem than a tenacious and hardy cell culture.... HeLa cells persist because they have always been helped along by a certain human element in science, an element connected to emotions, egos, a reluctance to admit mistakes...." Gold continues, "It's all human - an unwillingness to throw away hours and hours of what was thought to be good research...worries about jeopardizing another grant that's being applied for, the hurrying to come out with a paper first. And it isn't limited to biology and cancer research. Scientists in many endeavors all make mistakes, and they all have the same problems".
Gold ends his book with the following statement of a virologist who discovered another contamination problem: "A 'HeLa' ... is a scientific claim that sucks people into a line of work for a while, a line that is later refuted or shown to be a waste of time. It's a type of error in science that occurs fairly often. And it will continue to exist". Rather than recognize or focus on the problem of HeLa and on how to resolve it, many scientists, researchers and science writers continue to document this problem as a contamination problem, or as a problem caused by the hardiness, tenacity, proliferating or overpowering nature or other characteristic of HeLa, the cell line created by Gey, discovered by Mary Kubicek,[7] a laboratory assistant, and named in this laboratory run by his nurse wife after this husband and wife team had engaged in almost two decades of research.
Other authors continue to focus on the issues surrounding the widespread HeLa contamination of cell lines used in research from the 1950s through at least the early 1980s as the major problem of HeLa in science.[8] Recent data suggest that cross contaminations are still a major ongoing problem with modern cell cultures.[9]
Author Rebecca Skloot has completed the first full length book focusing on the story of Henrietta Lacks and her family, which is being published by Crown Publishers.
Uniqueness of cells
It suggests at the end of the article that Lack's cells were unique in remaining alive. Shouldn't this be given greater relevance, or at least included much earlier in the text? Otherwise the reader is left wondering why this particular woman's cells were chosen.--86.14.45.250 (talk) 15:25, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
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