Henrietta Lacks, an African American woman who lived in Virginia died of cervical cancer in 1951. And later in the year, she became immortal. Cells harvested from her tumour still live and are subjected to various tests in laboratories all over the world
HeLa cells
Researchers need laboratory grown cells to learn about them and also to test various theories. Called ‘cell lines’, they are grown in the laboratory and are distributed to labs. After Lacks passed away, a scientist at the Johns Hopkins hospital in the US created the first immortal cell line from her tissue sample
Mystery donor
Named HeLa cells, the cell line became valuable to research although the donor remained a mystery. HeLa cells have made contributions to the development of drugs for leukemia, influenza, and Parkinson's disease, according to National Geographic
Movie on the cards
Journalist Rebecca Skloot tracked down the story of Lacks in her best-selling book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Only after the book was published, the world came to know about Lacks and how her family was kept in the dark about HeLa cells. A movie based on the book stars talkshow host Oprah Winfrey and is to be released in April