Prelude: "The elementary particles of organisms" -- Introduction: "We shall always return to the cell" -- Part one: Discovery -- The original cell: an invisible world -- The visible cell: "Fictitious stories about the little animals" -- The universal cell: "The smallest particle of this little world" -- The pathogenic cell: microbes, infections, and the antibiotic revolution -- Part two: The one and the many -- The organized cell: the interior anatomy of the cell -- The dividing cell: cellular reproduction and the birth of IVF -- The tampered cell: Lulu, Nana, and the transgressions of trust -- The developing cell: a cell becomes and organism -- Part three: Blood -- The restless cell: circles of blood -- The healing cell: platelets, clots, and a "modern epidemic" -- The guardian cell: neutrophils and their kampf against pathogens -- The defending cell: when a body meets a body -- The discerning cell: the subtle intelligence of the T cell -- The tolerant cell: the self, horror antitoxicus, and immunotherapy -- Part four: Knowledge -- The pandemic -- Part five: Organs -- The citizen cell: the benefits of belonging -- The contemplating cell: the many-minded neuron -- The orchestrating cell: homeostasis, fixity, and balance -- Part six: Rebirth -- The renewing cell: stem cells and the birth of transplantation -- The repairing cell: injury, decay, and constancy -- The selfish cell: the ecological equation and cancer -- The songs of the cell -- Epilogue: "Better versions of me".
Summary:
In the late 1600s a distinguished English polymath, Robert Hooke, and an eccentric Dutch cloth-merchant, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek looked down their handmade microscopes and saw that complex living organisms are assemblages of tiny, self-contained, self-regulating units. Our organs, our physiology, our selves — hearts, blood, brains — are built from these compartments. Hooke christened them “cells.” The discovery of cells and the reframing of the human body as a cellular ecosystem announced the birth of a new kind of medicine based on the therapeutic manipulations of cells. Told in six parts, and laced with the author’s own experiences, "The Song of the Cell" is both panoramic and intimate: a masterpiece on what it means to be human.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.