Diocesan News

Only in Print: Biology Class Sees Tale of the Vape

Students from Bishop Loughlin M.H.S., Fort Greene, learn about the effects of vaping by examining how a live organism called a tetrahymena reacts to e-cigarette vapor. (Photo: Allyson Escobar)

FORT GREENE — “Tetrahymena” is a big, fancy word, and not a common one.

It’s a scientific term that refers to a single-cell organism that mimics a real living human cell. Seniors and juniors in an advanced biology class at Bishop Loughlin Memorial H.S., Fort Greene, created tetrahymenas in a lab in order to test the effects of vaping on cells.

The results: the “tetra” begins to die.

The experiment serves as a tool to teach teenagers about the harm vaping can cause and is an example of the cutting-edge learning that’s going on at a Catholic school in the Diocese of Brooklyn…


The rest of this article can be found exclusively in the March 7 printed version of The Tablet. You can buy it at church for $1, or you can receive future editions of the paper in your mailbox at a discounted rate by subscribing here. Thank you for supporting Catholic journalism.