Cells and researchers in motion: making sense of the circulation and valuation of stem cells through mobile and intersecting ethnographies

摘要: Novel entities like stem-cells and related medical therapies have become key sites of biomedical innovation and capital accumulation (Salter et al. 2015). Little attention has yet been paid to how biological materials circulate and acquire value, what kinds of value, and for whom. Following Appadurai (1986)’s methodological principle that things-in-motion illuminate their human and social context, we follow the trajectories and analyze the social life of human cells as they leave bodies to be stored, modified, transported, frozen or injected.