Abstract

The HeLa cell line, named after the patient Henrietta Lacks, was one the first human cell lines to be used for tissue culture. In the decades since its origin, it has become a feature in labs across the world. Despite its longevity, repeated detection of most HeLa marker chromosomes have lead the scientific community to view HeLa as a stable cell line and its corresponding findings to be reproducible. However, to date no investigation has examined other meaningful aspects of HeLa's genomic variability, such has whether HeLa's modal chromosome number remains constant. Considering the importance of a cell line's karyotype with respect to reproducibility, I sought to examine the stability of HeLa's karyotype by examining HeLa's modal chromosome number as reported in the literature.