X-Message-Number: 1934 From: (Carl Feynman) Newsgroups: sci.cryonics Subject: Re: A living head? Message-ID: <> Date: 10 Mar 93 08:48:48 GMT References: <> In article <> (Joni Jarvenkyla) writes: Have there been experiments of getting "living heads"? An extensive review of this topic may be found in the book "If we can keep a severed head alive" by Chet Fleming. Mr. Fleming has patented the technology neccesary to perfuse an isolated head, in an attempt to discourage such research until an ethical concensus can be formed as to whether it sould be allowed. What a wuss. The rest of this message is derived from this book. Expeiments in the maintenance of isolated heads have been performed in animals. These experiments were done not in order to develop the technology, but in order to isolate the head from the metabolism of the rest of the body, as part of fundamental research into the physiology of the brain. The brainwaves persisted for several hours, but the animals were sedated into unconsciousness, so it's not clear how much mental functioning was maintained. >From a theoretical point of view, it would appear perfectly feasible to maintain a severed human head indefinitely, using a heart-lung machine, an artificial kidney, a hyperalimentation pump to supply nutrients, and periodic blood replacements to keep the blood chemistry from getting too far off normal. The cost would be immense and it wouldn't be much fun. Grafting a head onto another individual of the same species has been done several times, with good results. The transplated heads apparently maintained normal mental functions for 36 hours, until the experimenters killed them. Of course, they had no muscular control over the host body. This course of research was discontinued because it was too icky. The book is published by Polinym Press, PO BOx 22140, St. Louis MO 63116. The copy I have was distributed by Loompanics Press, which is probably easier to get a hold of. The author also published an article on the topic in the Whole Earth review about five years ago. --carlf "Anything that can be done must be done." Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=1934