Question

1. In class, we discussed the famous cancer cell line known as HeLa cells, which were named after Henrietta Lacks, the woman that the cells were isolated from. Henrietta was diagnosed with cervical cancer in 1951 and treated at Johns Hopkins. At the time, little was known about cancer genetics, so the doctors treated her cancer with high doses of radiation, which induces DNA damage and was a standard treatment option at the time. Unfortunately, the treatment caused Henrietta’s cancer to become more aggressive and she died just a few short months later. Since then, many researchers have studied her cells and found that her cancer was caused by the human papililloma virus (HPV). Moreover, we now know that HPV causes cancer by expressing two proteins (E6 and E7) that inhibit the function of two different tumor suppressor proteins, p53 and Rb. Why do you think that the radiation treatment did not work for Henrietta?  

Answer 1