Tattoo You: Immune System Cells Help Keep Ink In Its Place
When you get a tattoo, your body mounts a battle against the ink. So how do ankle flowers and bicep hearts stick around so long? Researchers took a look at specialized cells that gobble up the ink.
by Menaka Wilhelm
Mar 08, 2018
4 minutes
Last Saturday, while I was visiting Fatty's Tattoos and Piercings, a college-aged woman in a hoodie walked in and asked for a tattoo, her first, right on the spot.
"I want a red-tailed hawk feather," she told the artist on duty at the Washington, D.C., tattoo parlor.
He peppered her with questions: How big? What style? She alternated between a blank stare and a furrowed brow: "I ... have a photo on my phone of the feather that I like, I could show you that?"
The artist rubbed his beard and told her he didn't do realistic tattoos. Maybe they should set up an appointment for her sometime next week,
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