Immortalised cell line
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An immortalised cell line is a population of cells from a multicellular organism that would normally not proliferate indefinitely but, due to mutation, have evaded normal cellular senescence and inste
Scanning electron micrograph of an apoptotic HeLa cell. Zeiss Merlin HR-SEM.
HeLa cells, an example of an immortalised cell line. DIC image, DNA stained with Hoechst 33258.
Henrietta Lacks
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Henrietta Lacks was an African-American woman whose cancer cells are the source of the HeLa cell line, the first immortalized human cell line and one of the most important cell lines in medical resear
Immortalised cell line
…occurring cancers. HeLa, the first immortal human cell line on record to be successfully isolated and proliferated by a laboratory, was taken from Henrietta Lacks in 1951 at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Immortalised cell lines are widely used as a simple model for more complex biological systems…
Lacks c. 1945–1951
Lacks Town Road in Clover, Virginia, near where Lacks grew up and is buried
Dividing HeLa cells in culture. The cells can be seen metaphase and telophase, different stages of cell division.
A historical marker memorializing Henrietta Lacks in Clover, Virginia