Koncocoo

Best Cell Biology

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks? (1999)Main Street in downtown Clover, Virginia, where Henrietta was raised, circa 1930s.Margaret Gey and Minnie, a lab technician, in the Gey lab at Hopkins, circa 1951.Deborah with her children, LaTonya and Alfred, and her second husband, James Pullum, in the mid-1980s.In 2001, Deborah developed a severe case of hives after learning upsetting new information about her mother and sister.Deborah and her cousin Gary Lacks standing in front of drying tobacco, 2001.The Lacks family in 2009.
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"Before reading this book I knew nothing about Henrietta Lacks nor the immortal cells."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
Find Best Price at Amazon
Molecular Biology of the Cell
As the amount of information in biology expands dramatically, it becomes increasingly important for textbooks to distill the vast amount of scientific knowledge into concise principles and enduring concepts.As with previous editions, Molecular Biology of the Cell , Sixth Edition accomplishes this goal with clear writing and beautiful illustrations. "Throughout the book, emphasis is placed not just on what 'we know' but also on 'how we know' and 'what remains to be discovered'- important for engaging and enthusing students....A quarter of a century after the first edition revolutionised cell biology textbooks, the new edition is as fresh, comprehensive and above all, as readable as ever....Like its predecessors, this is a superb textbook for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students." "Professors, lecturers, and instructors will find the fifth edition of the book Molecular Biology of the Cell and its accompanying Problems Book to be an excellent choice for guiding their students through the maze of the cell's molecular structures and biochemical processes....With countless colorful illustrations and a large number of photographs and tables, reading the text becomes not only an educational experience, but also a highly enjoyable one for those students who wish to discover the inner workings of the magnificent cellular machine....Educators will also find the DVD-ROM to be a rich electronic resource when compiling their lectures....No less important is the Problems Book, which contains numerous exercises and questions that are an integral part of the learning process, and that teachers, instructors, and students are sure to appreciate."
Reviews
"[Update, September 2017: Just a caution here that there now seem to be two Kindle editions of the book available. The original "eTextbook / Print Replica Kindle Edition" which is like a PDF file of the actual printed book, and a new "Kindle Edition" which is *not* in Print Replica format. Personally I prefer the original eTextbook edition which is an exact reproduction of the printed book. This review is based (mostly, see update at the end) on the Kindle edition of the book, which is a "Print Replica" edition which exactly matches the printed textbook (it's essentially like a PDF of the entire book). This sixth edition is very different from the fifth (the authors point out that five million scientific papers were written since the previous edition) and you might *not* get away with buying a cheaper used previous edition. If your class is going into enough depth that it needs this book over something like Essential Cell Biology, 4th Edition then chances are you really do need the correct edition. To get started I recommend reading chapter 1 thoroughly, then read chapter 2 but if your eyes start to glaze over then just skip the rest of chapter 2 for now (the chemistry, while obviously fundamental and critically important is not necessary to understand deeply in order to understand the rest of the book, just as you don't really need to understand voltages and transistors in order to learn to program a computer), and then read Chapter 3 thoroughly which is all about how proteins perform most of the work in the cell including acting as microprocessors, motors, pumps, etc. Well, first of all it has been seven years since the previous edition, which is nearly forever in the world of Biology, so just on that basis alone the new edition is going to be a big advance. In the fifth edition, the book exploded past its covers and the standard edition was forced to relegate the last five chapters to PDF supplements (a huge Reference Edition with over 1600 pages was available with all chapters printed, and the e-book versions include all chapters). The sixth edition now includes the entire content of the book, and there's no need for a "Reference" edition. Taking as an example chapter 4, Control of Gene Expression, the current edition has 79 figures where the previous edition had 115. Also the chapter on Sexual Reproduction has been eliminated entirely (you can download the fifth edition version of this chapter as a PDF, see the update below) though some of its material has been integrated into other parts of the book. It's hardbound, and has the same feel and quality as the Reference edition version of the fifth edition. The physical book does NOT come with CD media for the supplemental movies and stuff, so you need to go to the Garland Science site to find them (under the Student tab you can search for the movie numbers from the book without needing to create an account, or you can create an account and add the book to it to make accessing things a little easier). They have also now added a downloadable PDF of "MBOC, Fifth Edition - Chapter 21: Sexual Reproduction: Meiosis, Germ Cells, and Fertilization" in the sixth edition downloads area."
"8 emphasizing the need for mathematics to unravel the massive complexities of cellular functions (e.g. the use of differential equations to shed light on the incredible amounts of chemical dynamics in cellular processes - similar to how engineers have been using these keep track of system dynamics); focusing on cell signaling with emphasis on key principles in the circuitry of signaling systems; new sections on timing, growth control, and morphogenesis of multicellular organisms; updates on stem cell biology and technologies, etc. One sample on the current flood of data on biological systems, they wrote: "Empowered by knowledge of complete genome sequences, we can list the genes, proteins, and RNA molecules in a cell, and we have methods that allow us to begin to depict the complex web of interactions between them. Most often, cell biologists studying the cell's control systems sum up the knowledge in simple schematic diagrams - this book is full of them - rather than in numbers, graphs, and differential equations. They implicitly show that molecular biology is leaning a bit more towards studying cells as Systems Engineering matters. A good intro to thinking in terms of systems is Systems Engineering and Analysis (5th Edition) (Prentice Hall International Series in Industrial & Systems Engineering) and also Design and Analysis of Biomolecular Circuits: Engineering Approaches to Systems and Synthetic Biology. The general Table of Contents for the 6th edition is at the very bottom of the review, but I wanted to point out some of the differences compared to the 5th edition early on: 5th edition, there were 25 chapters total, but the last 4 chapters were on a DVD, not the book. 6th edition, there are 24 chapters and everything is in one book, but one chapter was left out - can be downloaded from the Garland Science website. 5th edition, Ch.2 title was "Cell Chemistry and Biosynthesis". 6th edition, Ch.2 title was replaced with "Cell Chemistry and Bioenergetics". 5th edition, Ch.8 title was "Manipulating Proteins, DNA, and RNA". 6th edition, Ch.8 title was replaced with "Analyzing Cells, Molecules, and Systems". 5th edition, Ch.13 title was "Intracellular Vesicular Traffic". 6th edition, Ch.13 title was replaced with "Intracellular Membrane Traffic". 5th edition, Ch.15 title was "Mechanisms of Cell Communication". 6th edition, Ch.15 title was replaced with "Cell Signalling". 5th edition, Ch.18 title was "Apoptosis". 6th edition, Ch.18 title was replaced with "Cell Death". 5th edition, Ch.19 title was "Cell Junctions, Cell Adhesion, and the Extracellular Matrix". 6th edition, Ch.19 title was replaced with "Cell Junctions and the Extracellular Matrix". 5th edition, Ch.21-25 were: 21. The Innate and Adaptive Immune Systems...NOTE: Chapter 21: Sexual Reproduction: Meiosis, Germ Cells, and Fertilization from the 5th edition can be downloaded from the Garland Science website for the 6th edition for free since it was left out of the 6th edition. 20 Cancer (the whole chapter) and the detailed Table of Contents. Cells are not simple things at all, rather they are ridiculously sophisticated nanomachines with self-coding and transcribing capabilities, automated control systems, self-reproductive capabilities, informational and chemical programming, they have multiple energy-source harnessing abilities, etc. What makes it even more mind boggling is that trillions of cells (37 trillion based on an updated estimate as of 2013) make up our own bodies and we have have 200 different cell types with numerous specializations that allow us to fight off diseases, repair our cellular machinery without disrupting the processes of living, execute multiple simultaneous development programs, repair damaged DNA from mutations, reproduce, preform emergency protocols, recover and replenish homeostasis, process and convert food into chemical energy and reserves, give ourselves momentary boosts of energy at will, etc. For those interested in a system views of life from cells to society, please check out The Systems View of Life: A Unifying Vision. The discourse on the chain of prebiotic complexity (molecules to biomonomers to macromolecules to compartments to genetic code to metabolic networks to cells) and also the downward causation triggered by cellular signalling resulting in feedback looping to and from "genes to proteins to pathways to sub-cellular mechanisms to cells to tissues to organs to organism" are worth checking out. For those interested in the impact of cellular research on evolutionary theory - shifting towards a dynamic systems view of cells and life - one can check out Evolution: A View from the 21st Century and The Logic of Chance: The Nature and Origin of Biological Evolution. Table of Contents for the 6th Edition: INTRODUCTION TO THE CELL. 1. Cells and Genomes. 2. How Cells Read the Genome: From DNA to Protein. 7. Analyzing Cells, Molecules, and Systems. 9. Visualizing Cells. INTERNAL ORGANIZATION OF THE CELL. 10. Cell Death. CELLS IN THEIR SOCIAL CONTEXT. 19."
"Not only is this a great text, but the Kindle version is amazing."
"A great introductory molecular/cell biology text book."
"The newest editions of these books unreasonably cost way too much, but it's easy to buy past editions from Amazon, for example, that are plenty good and mucho cheaper."
"This would be great... except the digital edition doesn't have a solutions cd, and solutions are not included in the text."
Find Best Price at Amazon
Molecular Biology of the Cell
As the amount of information in biology expands dramatically, it becomes increasingly important for textbooks to distill the vast amount of scientific knowledge into concise principles and enduring concepts.As with previous editions, Molecular Biology of the Cell , Sixth Edition accomplishes this goal with clear writing and beautiful illustrations. "Throughout the book, emphasis is placed not just on what 'we know' but also on 'how we know' and 'what remains to be discovered'- important for engaging and enthusing students....A quarter of a century after the first edition revolutionised cell biology textbooks, the new edition is as fresh, comprehensive and above all, as readable as ever....Like its predecessors, this is a superb textbook for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students." "Professors, lecturers, and instructors will find the fifth edition of the book Molecular Biology of the Cell and its accompanying Problems Book to be an excellent choice for guiding their students through the maze of the cell's molecular structures and biochemical processes....With countless colorful illustrations and a large number of photographs and tables, reading the text becomes not only an educational experience, but also a highly enjoyable one for those students who wish to discover the inner workings of the magnificent cellular machine....Educators will also find the DVD-ROM to be a rich electronic resource when compiling their lectures....No less important is the Problems Book, which contains numerous exercises and questions that are an integral part of the learning process, and that teachers, instructors, and students are sure to appreciate."
Reviews
"[Update, September 2017: Just a caution here that there now seem to be two Kindle editions of the book available. The original "eTextbook / Print Replica Kindle Edition" which is like a PDF file of the actual printed book, and a new "Kindle Edition" which is *not* in Print Replica format. Personally I prefer the original eTextbook edition which is an exact reproduction of the printed book. This review is based (mostly, see update at the end) on the Kindle edition of the book, which is a "Print Replica" edition which exactly matches the printed textbook (it's essentially like a PDF of the entire book). This sixth edition is very different from the fifth (the authors point out that five million scientific papers were written since the previous edition) and you might *not* get away with buying a cheaper used previous edition. If your class is going into enough depth that it needs this book over something like Essential Cell Biology, 4th Edition then chances are you really do need the correct edition. To get started I recommend reading chapter 1 thoroughly, then read chapter 2 but if your eyes start to glaze over then just skip the rest of chapter 2 for now (the chemistry, while obviously fundamental and critically important is not necessary to understand deeply in order to understand the rest of the book, just as you don't really need to understand voltages and transistors in order to learn to program a computer), and then read Chapter 3 thoroughly which is all about how proteins perform most of the work in the cell including acting as microprocessors, motors, pumps, etc. Well, first of all it has been seven years since the previous edition, which is nearly forever in the world of Biology, so just on that basis alone the new edition is going to be a big advance. In the fifth edition, the book exploded past its covers and the standard edition was forced to relegate the last five chapters to PDF supplements (a huge Reference Edition with over 1600 pages was available with all chapters printed, and the e-book versions include all chapters). The sixth edition now includes the entire content of the book, and there's no need for a "Reference" edition. Taking as an example chapter 4, Control of Gene Expression, the current edition has 79 figures where the previous edition had 115. Also the chapter on Sexual Reproduction has been eliminated entirely (you can download the fifth edition version of this chapter as a PDF, see the update below) though some of its material has been integrated into other parts of the book. It's hardbound, and has the same feel and quality as the Reference edition version of the fifth edition. The physical book does NOT come with CD media for the supplemental movies and stuff, so you need to go to the Garland Science site to find them (under the Student tab you can search for the movie numbers from the book without needing to create an account, or you can create an account and add the book to it to make accessing things a little easier). They have also now added a downloadable PDF of "MBOC, Fifth Edition - Chapter 21: Sexual Reproduction: Meiosis, Germ Cells, and Fertilization" in the sixth edition downloads area."
"8 emphasizing the need for mathematics to unravel the massive complexities of cellular functions (e.g. the use of differential equations to shed light on the incredible amounts of chemical dynamics in cellular processes - similar to how engineers have been using these keep track of system dynamics); focusing on cell signaling with emphasis on key principles in the circuitry of signaling systems; new sections on timing, growth control, and morphogenesis of multicellular organisms; updates on stem cell biology and technologies, etc. One sample on the current flood of data on biological systems, they wrote: "Empowered by knowledge of complete genome sequences, we can list the genes, proteins, and RNA molecules in a cell, and we have methods that allow us to begin to depict the complex web of interactions between them. Most often, cell biologists studying the cell's control systems sum up the knowledge in simple schematic diagrams - this book is full of them - rather than in numbers, graphs, and differential equations. They implicitly show that molecular biology is leaning a bit more towards studying cells as Systems Engineering matters. A good intro to thinking in terms of systems is Systems Engineering and Analysis (5th Edition) (Prentice Hall International Series in Industrial & Systems Engineering) and also Design and Analysis of Biomolecular Circuits: Engineering Approaches to Systems and Synthetic Biology. The general Table of Contents for the 6th edition is at the very bottom of the review, but I wanted to point out some of the differences compared to the 5th edition early on: 5th edition, there were 25 chapters total, but the last 4 chapters were on a DVD, not the book. 6th edition, there are 24 chapters and everything is in one book, but one chapter was left out - can be downloaded from the Garland Science website. 5th edition, Ch.2 title was "Cell Chemistry and Biosynthesis". 6th edition, Ch.2 title was replaced with "Cell Chemistry and Bioenergetics". 5th edition, Ch.8 title was "Manipulating Proteins, DNA, and RNA". 6th edition, Ch.8 title was replaced with "Analyzing Cells, Molecules, and Systems". 5th edition, Ch.13 title was "Intracellular Vesicular Traffic". 6th edition, Ch.13 title was replaced with "Intracellular Membrane Traffic". 5th edition, Ch.15 title was "Mechanisms of Cell Communication". 6th edition, Ch.15 title was replaced with "Cell Signalling". 5th edition, Ch.18 title was "Apoptosis". 6th edition, Ch.18 title was replaced with "Cell Death". 5th edition, Ch.19 title was "Cell Junctions, Cell Adhesion, and the Extracellular Matrix". 6th edition, Ch.19 title was replaced with "Cell Junctions and the Extracellular Matrix". 5th edition, Ch.21-25 were: 21. The Innate and Adaptive Immune Systems...NOTE: Chapter 21: Sexual Reproduction: Meiosis, Germ Cells, and Fertilization from the 5th edition can be downloaded from the Garland Science website for the 6th edition for free since it was left out of the 6th edition. 20 Cancer (the whole chapter) and the detailed Table of Contents. Cells are not simple things at all, rather they are ridiculously sophisticated nanomachines with self-coding and transcribing capabilities, automated control systems, self-reproductive capabilities, informational and chemical programming, they have multiple energy-source harnessing abilities, etc. What makes it even more mind boggling is that trillions of cells (37 trillion based on an updated estimate as of 2013) make up our own bodies and we have have 200 different cell types with numerous specializations that allow us to fight off diseases, repair our cellular machinery without disrupting the processes of living, execute multiple simultaneous development programs, repair damaged DNA from mutations, reproduce, preform emergency protocols, recover and replenish homeostasis, process and convert food into chemical energy and reserves, give ourselves momentary boosts of energy at will, etc. For those interested in a system views of life from cells to society, please check out The Systems View of Life: A Unifying Vision. The discourse on the chain of prebiotic complexity (molecules to biomonomers to macromolecules to compartments to genetic code to metabolic networks to cells) and also the downward causation triggered by cellular signalling resulting in feedback looping to and from "genes to proteins to pathways to sub-cellular mechanisms to cells to tissues to organs to organism" are worth checking out. For those interested in the impact of cellular research on evolutionary theory - shifting towards a dynamic systems view of cells and life - one can check out Evolution: A View from the 21st Century and The Logic of Chance: The Nature and Origin of Biological Evolution. Table of Contents for the 6th Edition: INTRODUCTION TO THE CELL. 1. Cells and Genomes. 2. How Cells Read the Genome: From DNA to Protein. 7. Analyzing Cells, Molecules, and Systems. 9. Visualizing Cells. INTERNAL ORGANIZATION OF THE CELL. 10. Cell Death. CELLS IN THEIR SOCIAL CONTEXT. 19."
"Not only is this a great text, but the Kindle version is amazing."
"A great introductory molecular/cell biology text book."
"The newest editions of these books unreasonably cost way too much, but it's easy to buy past editions from Amazon, for example, that are plenty good and mucho cheaper."
"This would be great... except the digital edition doesn't have a solutions cd, and solutions are not included in the text."
Find Best Price at Amazon

Best Biology

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks? (1999)Main Street in downtown Clover, Virginia, where Henrietta was raised, circa 1930s.Margaret Gey and Minnie, a lab technician, in the Gey lab at Hopkins, circa 1951.Deborah with her children, LaTonya and Alfred, and her second husband, James Pullum, in the mid-1980s.In 2001, Deborah developed a severe case of hives after learning upsetting new information about her mother and sister.Deborah and her cousin Gary Lacks standing in front of drying tobacco, 2001.The Lacks family in 2009.
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"Before reading this book I knew nothing about Henrietta Lacks nor the immortal cells."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
Find Best Price at Amazon

Best Medical History

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks? (1999)Main Street in downtown Clover, Virginia, where Henrietta was raised, circa 1930s.Margaret Gey and Minnie, a lab technician, in the Gey lab at Hopkins, circa 1951.Deborah with her children, LaTonya and Alfred, and her second husband, James Pullum, in the mid-1980s.In 2001, Deborah developed a severe case of hives after learning upsetting new information about her mother and sister.Deborah and her cousin Gary Lacks standing in front of drying tobacco, 2001.The Lacks family in 2009.
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"Before reading this book I knew nothing about Henrietta Lacks nor the immortal cells."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
Find Best Price at Amazon

Best Special Groups

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
From a former marine and Yale Law School graduate, a powerful account of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town that offers a broader, probing look at the struggles of America’s white working class. They raised a middle-class family, and eventually their grandchild (the author) would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of their success in achieving generational upward mobility. Vance’s grandparents, aunt, uncle, sister, and, most of all, his mother, struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, and were never able to fully escape the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. ''[A] compassionate, discerning sociological analysis...Combining thoughtful inquiry with firsthand experience, Mr. Vance has inadvertently provided a civilized reference guide for an uncivilized election, and he's done so in a vocabulary intelligible to both Democrats and Republicans. ( Jennifer Senior, New York Times ). ''[ Hillbilly Elegy ] is a beautiful memoir but it is equally a work of cultural criticism about white working-class America....[Vance] offers a compelling explanation for why it's so hard for someone who grew up the way he did to make it...a riveting book.''. ''[An] understated, engaging debut...An unusually timely and deeply affecting view of a social class whose health and economic problems are making headlines in this election year.''. ''Vance compellingly describes the terrible toll that alcoholism, drug abuse, and an unrelenting code of honor took on his family, neither excusing the behavior nor condemning it...The portrait that emerges is a complex one...Unerringly forthright, remarkably insightful, and refreshingly focused, Hillbilly Elegy is the cry of a community in crisis.''. ''A beautifully and powerfully written memoir about the author's journey from a troubled, addiction-torn Appalachian family to Yale Law School, Hillbilly Elegy is shocking, heartbreaking, gut-wrenching, and hysterically funny. It's also a profoundly important book, one that opens a window on a part of America usually hidden from view and offers genuine hope in the form of hard-hitting honesty. From a former marine and Yale Law School graduate, a probing look at the struggles of America’s white working class through the author’s own story of growing up in a poor Rust Belt town. The disintegration of this group, a process that has been slowly occurring now for over forty years, has been reported with growing frequency and alarm, but has never before been written about as searingly from the inside. J.D.’s grandparents were “dirt poor and in love” and moved north from Kentucky’s Appalachia region to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a middle-class family, and eventually one of their grandchildren would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of success in achieving generational upward mobility. But as the family saga of Hillbilly Elegy plays out, we learn that J.D.’s grandparents, aunt, uncle, sister, and, most of all, his mother struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, never fully escaping the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. A deeply moving memoir, with its share of humor and vividly colorful figures, Hillbilly Elegy is the story of how upward mobility really feels.
Reviews
"Drugs, crime, jail time, abusive interactions without any knowledge of other forms of interaction, children growing up in a wild mix of stoned mother care, foster care, and care by temporary "boyfriends," and in general, an image of life on the edge of survival where even the heroes are distinctly flawed for lack of knowledge and experience of any other way of living. Second, the author's growing realization, fully present by the end of the work, that while individuals do not have total control over the shapes of their lives, their choices do in fact matter—that even if one can't direct one's life like a film, one does always have the at least the input into life that comes from being free to make choices, every day, and in every situation. I hate to fall into self-analysis and virtue-signaling behavior in a public review, but in this case I feel compelled to say that the author really did leave with me a renewed motivation to make more of my life every day, to respect and consider the choices that confront me much more carefully, and to seize moments of opportunity with aplomb when they present themselves."
"I never heard of the author until I saw him on Morning Joe a few days ago but I looked him up and read several articles he wrote for various publications so I bought his book. He suggests that tribalism, mistrust of outsiders and "elites," violence and irresponsibility among family members, parents without ethics and a sense of responsibility, terrible work ethics, and an us-against-them mentality is dooming the people who live that way to becoming poorer, more addicted, and more marginalized."
"I grew up without running water in Boone County, WV, and wound up with a degree from Harvard Law School."
"I escaped inner city Baltimore (see The Wire) due to luck, the ability to do well in school and a few good teachers.Instead of trying to describe my early life to my family and friends, I will give them this book."
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Best Medical Research

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks?
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
"When a friend recommended this book I'd never heard of Henrietta Lacks or HeLa."
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Best Women's Studies

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks? (1999)Main Street in downtown Clover, Virginia, where Henrietta was raised, circa 1930s.Margaret Gey and Minnie, a lab technician, in the Gey lab at Hopkins, circa 1951.Deborah with her children, LaTonya and Alfred, and her second husband, James Pullum, in the mid-1980s.In 2001, Deborah developed a severe case of hives after learning upsetting new information about her mother and sister.Deborah and her cousin Gary Lacks standing in front of drying tobacco, 2001.The Lacks family in 2009.
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"Before reading this book I knew nothing about Henrietta Lacks nor the immortal cells."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
Find Best Price at Amazon

Best Biographies of Scientists

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks? (1999)Main Street in downtown Clover, Virginia, where Henrietta was raised, circa 1930s.Margaret Gey and Minnie, a lab technician, in the Gey lab at Hopkins, circa 1951.Deborah with her children, LaTonya and Alfred, and her second husband, James Pullum, in the mid-1980s.In 2001, Deborah developed a severe case of hives after learning upsetting new information about her mother and sister.Deborah and her cousin Gary Lacks standing in front of drying tobacco, 2001.The Lacks family in 2009.
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"Before reading this book I knew nothing about Henrietta Lacks nor the immortal cells."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
Find Best Price at Amazon

Best Science History & Philosophy

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks? (1999)Main Street in downtown Clover, Virginia, where Henrietta was raised, circa 1930s.Margaret Gey and Minnie, a lab technician, in the Gey lab at Hopkins, circa 1951.Deborah with her children, LaTonya and Alfred, and her second husband, James Pullum, in the mid-1980s.In 2001, Deborah developed a severe case of hives after learning upsetting new information about her mother and sister.Deborah and her cousin Gary Lacks standing in front of drying tobacco, 2001.The Lacks family in 2009.
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"Before reading this book I knew nothing about Henrietta Lacks nor the immortal cells."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
Find Best Price at Amazon

Best African-American Studies

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks? (1999)Main Street in downtown Clover, Virginia, where Henrietta was raised, circa 1930s.Margaret Gey and Minnie, a lab technician, in the Gey lab at Hopkins, circa 1951.Deborah with her children, LaTonya and Alfred, and her second husband, James Pullum, in the mid-1980s.In 2001, Deborah developed a severe case of hives after learning upsetting new information about her mother and sister.Deborah and her cousin Gary Lacks standing in front of drying tobacco, 2001.The Lacks family in 2009.
Reviews
"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"Before reading this book I knew nothing about Henrietta Lacks nor the immortal cells."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
Find Best Price at Amazon