There are already several companies in the world that offer human cryopreservation services, such as the U.S.-based Alcor Life Extension Foundation, the Cryonics Institute and the Russian company KrioRus.
Dennis Kowalski, director of the nonprofit Human Cryonics Institute, says, “Most cryonics people share two characteristics; we’re obviously science fiction fans and we’re all optimists.” Kowalski has contracted for himself, his wife and several sons to receive cryopreservation after their deaths.
Kowalski said optimism is important because as of now “it’s 100 percent impossible.” But he said that in the past, people did not know that cardiac resuscitation (CPR) could save many people whose hearts had stopped beating, and with the development of technology, it is now a reality.
Kowalski compared the process of freezing to “riding in an ambulance to a hospital of the future, the existence of which is uncertain.
The freezing process
It is not yet possible to freeze a living person, but after a doctor has declared him dead. The Institute of Human Cryonics describes that on the one hand, the law does not allow this, and on the other hand, the technology required to freeze a living person is more demanding.
The current operation is that the medical team from Human Cryonics Services can start to intervene only at the moment when the medical staff recognizes the “legal” death. They first cool the body with ice water, put it in a sealed container and fly it to a human freezing plant.
Once at the cryonics plant, they connect the body to a machine similar to a heart-lung bypass operation, which circulates blood through the body and keeps it oxygenated. Then inject a drug similar to antifreeze to prevent the crystallization of the body’s soft tissues, which is designed to minimize the damage to the body’s various tissues at low temperatures. After that, the body is placed into a liquid nitrogen vapor chamber, which slowly cools the body to minus 320 degrees Fahrenheit. After reaching a low enough temperature, the body is sent to a tank containing liquid nitrogen for storage until humans have the ability to revive them in the future.
Problems ahead
Kovalsky said that even if future technology can revive the body, there are three major challenges to solve: repairing any frostbite, treating the body’s original disease, and rejuvenating the body to enjoy a new life. It is unclear what technology will do this, perhaps using molecular nanotechnology, tissue reconstructive surgery, etc.
These are the challenges that proponents of human cryonics admit to facing, and Discover Magazine interviewed several cryobiologists who said the process of freezing also has many technical problems.
Shannon Tessier of Harvard University said, “There is absolutely no way to freeze a human body without causing complete damage. What I’m saying is that human tissue would be completely destroyed. When scientists want to freeze any human tissue, like a section of liver tissue, that tissue is completely destroyed, the cell walls are completely destroyed. So there’s no evidence that you can save anything at all, the technology isn’t there now.”
It’s true that some animals can be frozen and then thawed and revived, like the Canadian wood frog, but the human body doesn’t seem to be designed to need to go through such a process, so humans can’t do it. Tessier said the human body can’t even withstand the thawing process. “I did an experiment two years ago trying to thaw a pig heart in the lab, and there’s no technology for rapid thawing yet, when the heart split into two pieces.”
John Baust of the State University of New York at Binghamton (SUNY) said the ability to withstand freezing and thawing is only part of the problem; in addition, when human tissue is frozen, what is frozen is water, and the remaining cells will undergo genetic changes. “These genetic changes signal the cells to let them die, also called apoptosis, a phenomenon that occurs before the target low temperature has been reached.”
An investment that only pays off
Now that regeneration seems to be quite difficult, does it make sense to do it?
Kowalski says that despite the many difficulties with this technology, no one can rule out the possibility of future success – just as one has never seen a unicorn, but one cannot deny the possibility of its existence.
Looking at the issue of cost, of course the cost varies from company to company, and the Human Cryonics Institute has one of the lowest costs, freezing the whole body for just $28,000. That’s already about the same price as buying a cemetery for less. Kovalsky said, “Everyone is going to face death, and by freezing there may be a glimmer of hope to live again.”
“It’s an investment that only pays off. For me, it’s worth it. Even if we can’t be revived in the future, we’re still constantly exploring and working on the problem. If it’s feasible, then it’s like we’ve found a way to postpone death.”
Recent Comments