BIOLOGIST

Henrietta Lacks

1920 - 1951

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Henrietta Lacks (born Loretta Pleasant; August 1, 1920 – October 4, 1951) 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 research. An immortalized cell line reproduces indefinitely under specific conditions, and the HeLa cell line continues to be a source of invaluable medical data to the present day. Lacks was the unwitting source of these cells from a tumor biopsied during treatment for cervical cancer at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1951. Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Henrietta Lacks has received more than 8,482,292 page views. Her biography is available in 35 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 33 in 2019). Henrietta Lacks is the 264th most popular biologist (down from 201st in 2019), the 2,457th most popular biography from United States (down from 2,114th in 2019) and the 50th most popular American Biologist.

Memorability Metrics

  • 8.5M

    Page Views (PV)

  • 56.40

    Historical Popularity Index (HPI)

  • 35

    Languages Editions (L)

  • 2.55

    Effective Languages (L*)

  • 4.69

    Coefficient of Variation (CV)

Among BIOLOGISTS

Among biologists, Henrietta Lacks ranks 264 out of 1,097. Before her are Carol W. Greider, Sergei Winogradsky, Johann Heinrich Friedrich Link, Friedrich Gustav Jakob Henle, James Bond, and John Lindley. After her are Erik Pontoppidan, Johann Friedrich von Brandt, Eric F. Wieschaus, Francis Darwin, David Julius, and Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1920, Henrietta Lacks ranks 125. Before her are Christopher Robin Milne, DeForest Kelley, Saul Bass, Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa, José Luis de Vilallonga, 9th Marquess of Castellbell, and Eva Dahlbeck. After her are Hiroyoshi Nishizawa, Albert Memmi, Yegor Ligachyov, Václav Neumann, Pran, and Jean Starobinski. Among people deceased in 1951, Henrietta Lacks ranks 57. Before her are Adam Stefan Sapieha, Agrippina Vaganova, Jakow Trachtenberg, Louis Jouvet, Osman Batur, and Liaquat Ali Khan. After her are Mikhail Borodin, Algernon Blackwood, Robert Grant Aitken, Tadeusz Borowski, Serge Koussevitzky, and Maria Montez.

Others Born in 1920

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Others Deceased in 1951

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In United States

Among people born in United States, Henrietta Lacks ranks 2,457 out of 20,380. Before her are John G. Thompson (1932), Al Oerter (1936), Jeb Bush (1953), Neil Sedaka (1939), Nicholas Sparks (1965), and Paris Hilton (1981). After her are Beverly D'Angelo (1951), Julian Schnabel (1951), Alan Ladd (1913), Chris Wallace (1947), Charles Durning (1923), and Debra Winger (1955).

Others born in United States

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Among BIOLOGISTS In United States

Among biologists born in United States, Henrietta Lacks ranks 50. Before her are Howard Martin Temin (1934), James Rothman (1950), Martin Chalfie (1947), Michael Rosbash (1944), Carol W. Greider (1961), and James Bond (1900). After her are Eric F. Wieschaus (1947), David Julius (1955), David Baltimore (1938), James P. Allison (1948), Gregory Goodwin Pincus (1903), and Bruce Beutler (1957).

American born Biologists

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