Word: polio
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Next, they needed an indisputable method of demonstrating what they had discovered that the polio virus actually grew in a test-tube...
They also knew that if they could grow the polio virus in sufficient quantities, it could be neutralized with formaldehyde, and used to produced antibodies--which would combat any polio germs in an inoculated person...
Proviously, all attempts at growing the virus has centered around the impractical use of infected monkey brain as culture material. But, as there seemed to be strong evidence that polio grew in the body as well as the brain, the two men decided to try to grow the virus on ordinary human skin cells. This reasoning seemed to be a logical step, especially since the chicken-pox had been grown with human tissue...
Taking some "throat washing"-saliva-from a woman infected with polio, they placed it in a test-tube with chopped-up pieces of human skin tissue, then awaited the results, hardly expecting to see any difference occur in the composition of the tissue cells...
...method of tissue culture. The simple idea was to place please of tissue in a test-tube with a special nutrient that would make the cells thrive. After observers had clearly established that the tissue cells were thriving on the nutrient tube, Robbins then injected a small amount of polio virus into the tube. To kill the tissue cells, the viruses would have to multiply in their experiments. Invariably, within one to five days the once-thriving tissue destroyed...