Flask with Glass Helices
date: label: date made
content: 1930s-1950s
notes: label: Description (Brief)
content: From the 1920s through the 1950s biologists and medical researchers made a concerted effort to solve the problem of tissue culture—how to raise and maintain cells for scientific research. Part of the challenge was to create a home outside the body in which cells could survive. At the National Cancer Institute, a team led by Wilton Earle (1902–1964) used tissue culture to study the process by which normal cells become cancerous. Earle, along with researchers Katherine Sanford, Virginia Evans, and Gwendolyn Likely, worked to develop proper nutrition—through a specially formulated broth—for cells grown in culture.
label: Description (Brief)
content: Early cells needed a support to cling to in order to grow properly. The NCI team utilized both sheets of cellophane and the small Pyrex glass helicies seen in this flask before improved broths eliminated the need for them.
label: Description (Brief)
content: This object was used in Dr. Wilton Earle’s laboratory at the National Cancer Institute. Earle joined NCI in 1937 and served as head of its Tissue Culture Section from 1946 to 1964. He and his researchers were pioneers in the use of tissue culture for cancer research.
label: Description (Brief)
content: Sources:
label: Description (Brief)
content: National Museum of American History Accession Files 1991.0071 & 1997.0139
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
topic: label: Subject
content: Science & Scientific Instruments
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Biological Sciences
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content: Health & Medicine
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content: Science Under Glass
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content: Science & Mathematics
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1997.0193.03
label: accession number
content: 1997.0193
label: catalog number
content: 1997.0193.03
objectType: label: Object Name
content: flask
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: glass (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 14 cm x 29.2 cm x 5.6 cm; 5 1/2 in x 11 1/2 in x 2 3/16 in