We were a sum of parts. The discovery of cells, and the reframing of the human body as a cellular ecosystem, also announced the birth of a new kind of medicine based on the therapeutic manipulations of cells. A hip fracture, cardiac arrest, immunodeficiency, Alzheimer’s dementia, AIDS, pneumonia, lung cancer, kidney failure, arthritis—all could be reconceived as the results of cells, or systems of cells, functioning abnormally. And all could be perceived as loci of cellular therapies.
