X-Message-Number: 12830
From: Thomas Donaldson <>
Subject: about storing DNA
Date: Thu, 25 Nov 1999 00:15:36 +1100 (EST)

About our DNA:

Although DNA at room temperature and normal conditions actually turns out
to be quite fragile, that simply isn't so at low temperatures. Moreover, 
current ideas about how our DNA works base themselves on the notion that
ALL our cells contain the same DNA. It is other factors which cover or
open out DNA sections which make our cells different from one another,
not any loss of particular genes in our skin cells, say.

This point is emphasized by the survival of stem cells in adult people.
Such cells can, with the right stimulation, grow into a wide variety of 
other cells, including neurons. That this may happen rarely comes not
from its impossibility but simply from the fact that the proper
stimulation usually isn't there.

Furthermore, we already know how to store individual cells of many kinds.
The problem (which 21st Century Medicine looks on the way to solving) 
is with storing whole organs. Again, at least in Alcor's suspensions,
some cell samples from the patient are stored with the patient.

These reasons suggest to me that any SEPARATE attempt to store your cells
for the DNA they contain basically is a way to spend extra money and get
no better suspension than before. I would suggest putting such money into
research by cryonicists to improve our suspension methods.

			Best wishes and long long life to all,

				Thomas Donaldson

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