What Do a New Award Winning Book and BioCrowd Have in Common?
Vincent Racaniello
, virologist extraordinaire and a BioCrowd co-founder is slated to appear on ABC World News this evening to discuss Rebecca Sloot’s new book entitled The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. The book details the life of little-known Henrietta Lack whose cancerous cervical cells (subsequently called HeLa cells by the scientists who managed to cultivate and immortalize them in the laboratory), revolutionized the field of virology and changed the way viral vaccines are manufactured.
Rebecca Skloot, the author, is an award-winning science writer, and a contributing editor at Popular Science magazine; she's worked as a correspondent for the NPR show RadioLab, and PBS Nova ScienceNOW. Her writing appears in The New York Times Magazine, O: The Oprah Magazine, Discover and others. The “Immortal Life of Henrietta Lack” is her first book.
So, why is Vincent being featured on tonight’s newscast about the HeLa book? For those of you who don’t know, Vincent has spent almost 30 years unraveling the molecular mechanisms by which the polio virus causes disease. And, as many of you may know, HeLa cells are the cell line of choice to cultivate polio virus in the laboratory. In addition to cloning the polio virus receptor in HeLa cells, members of Vincent’s laboratory have elucidated the genes and their proteins responsible for the neurotrophic effects of the virus that can lead to paralysis from polio infections. Further, for those of you who may not know, Vincent, while a postdoctoral fellow in David Baltimore's laboratory, was the first to demonstrate that transfection of HeLa cells with cDNA made from polio virus genomic RNA (using the newly discovered HIV reverse transcriptase enzyme that resulted in Baltimore winning the 1975 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine) yielded infectious polio virions.
While Vincent’s findings greatly aided research to elucidate the underlying pathogenic mechanisms of the polio virus, it transformed and revolutionized the entire field of RNA virology. Prior to Vincent’s discovery, it was impossible to study the molecular biology of RNA viruses using recombinant methods because unlike DNA, there are no known RNA restriction enzymes. The ability to transcribe viral RNA into cDNA molecules that yield infection RNA viral particles permitted researchers to dissect RNA virus genomes (using recombinant DNA technology) to determine contribution of individual genes to viral pathogenesis.
Vincent, one of only a handful of virus pioneers, is now applying his considerable pioneering talents to social media because he believes that Web 2.0 tools like blogs, podcasts, videos and social networking sites can be successfully used for science education and improving the public understanding of the life sciences.
Until next time...
Good Luck and Good Viewing (ABC World News Tonight)!!!!!!
Stemcyte
t to discuss scientific considerations for safety testing for cellular therapy products derived from human embryonic stem cells. , the committee will meet to discuss updates on the following topics: (1) Research management related to the September 29, 2005, review of research programs of the Office of Cellular, Tissue and Gene Therapies, Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research; (2) 's Somatic Cell Therapy Letter; and (3) recently released FDA guidance documents." 
