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Jessica Maria Alba (born April 28, 1981) is an american television and film actress.

Alba is considered a sex symbol and often generates media attention for her looks. She appears frequently on the "Hot 100" section of Maxim and was voted number one on AskMen.com's list of "99 Most Desirable Women" in 2006, as well as "Sexiest Woman in the World" by FHM in 2007.

Alba was born in Pomona, California to Catherine Jensen and Mark Alba. Her mother is of Danish and French Canadian descent and her father is Mexican American, though both of his parents were born in California (on the December 1, 2009 episode of Lopez Tonight, George Lopez announced that a DNA test showed Alba to be 87% European and 13% Indigenous American). She has a younger brother, Joshua. Her father's Air Force career took the family to Biloxi, Mississippi, and Del Rio, Texas before settling back in California when she was nine years old. Alba described her family as being a "very conservative family—a traditional, Catholic, Latin American family" and herself as very liberal; she says she had described herself as a "feminist" as early as age five.

Alba expressed interest in acting since the age of five. In 1992, the 11-year-old Alba persuaded her mother to take her to an acting competition in Beverly Hills, California whose grand prize was free acting classes. Alba won and an agent signed Alba nine months later. Her first appearance on film was a small role in the 1994 feature Camp Nowhere as Gail.

She was later featured in several independent films. She branched out into television in 1994 with a recurring role as the vain Jessica in the Nickelodeon comedy series The Secret World of Alex Mack. She then performed the role of Maya in the first two seasons of the television series Flipper.

In 1998, she appeared as Melissa Hauer in crime-drama Brooklyn South, as Leanne in two episodes of Beverly Hills, 90210, and as Layla in an episode of The Love Boat: The Next Wave.

Alba rose to greater prominence in Hollywood in 1999 after appearing as a member of a snobby high school clique in the romantic comedy Never Been Kissed, and as the female lead in the 1999 comedy-horror film Idle Hands.

Her big break came when writer/director James Cameron picked Alba from a pool of 1,200 candidates for the role of the genetically-engineered super-soldier, Max Guevara, on the television series Dark Angel.

In 2006, Alba received an MTV Movie Award for "Sexiest Performance" for Sin City. Her acting has also drawn criticism, however, as she was nominated for a 2007 Razzie Award for Worst Actress for her performances in Awake, Good Luck Chuck, and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.

In 2008 Alba made her acting transition to the horror-film genre in The Eye.

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