Famous Tumors
On the next Radiolab: famous tumors. Say hello to the growth that killed Ulysses S. Grant, and get to know the woman whose cancer cells changed modern medicine. The good, bad… and ugly side of anatomical aberrations.
To start, Robert tries to touch--literally touch--the tumor that killed President Ulysses S. Grant. But will its keepers (Dr. Adrianne Noe and Brian Spatola) let him?
Next, writer David Quammen explains an unsettling discovery in Tasmania. When wildlife photographer Christo Baars noticed strange ...
Can a tumor ever be a source of good? Neurologist Dr. Orrin Devinsky thinks so. He recalls the true story of a man, his tumor, and a euphoric reaction to safety pins. Next,Mark Salzman reads from his novel Lying Awake. When a nun develops a brain tumor, ...
We end with the extraordinary story of Henrietta Lacks. Though she died of cervical cancer in 1951, she unknowingly held the key to unlocking medical advancements (from polio vaccines to chemotherapy drugs) in her tumor cells. After taking a biopsy of Henrietta's cervical cancer, researcher Dr. George Gey and his ...