Uses in Experimental Biology
Stanley Michael Gartler used X chromosome inactivation to demonstrate the clonal origin of cancers. Examining normal tissues and tumors from females heterozygous for isoenzymes of the sex-linked G6PD gene demonstrated that tumor cells from such individuals express only one form of G6PD, whereas normal tissues are composed of a nearly equal mixture of cells expressing the two different phenotypes. This pattern suggests that a single cell, and not a population, grows into a cancer.
Read more about this topic: X-inactivation
Famous quotes containing the words experimental and/or biology:
“If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning, concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to flames: for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)
“Nothing can be more incorrect than the assumption one sometimes meets with, that physics has one method, chemistry another, and biology a third.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)