Why is easy bruising so common in older adults? Most bruises form when small blood vessels (capillaries) near the skin's surface are broken by the impact of a blow or injury â often on the arms or legs. When this happens, blood leaks out of the vessels and initially appears as a black-and-blue mark. Eventually your body reabsorbs the blood, and the mark disappears.
HeLa cell. HeLa cell, a cancerous cell belonging to a strain continuously cultured since its isolation in 1951 from a patient suffering from cervical carcinoma. The designation HeLa is derived from the name of the patient, Henrietta Lacks.
In the midst of that, one group of scientists tracked down Henriettaâs relatives to take some samples with hopes that they could use the familyâs DNA to make a map of Henriettaâs genes so they could tell which cell cultures were HeLa and which werenât, to begin straightening out the contamination problem.