X-Message-Number: 2289 Newsgroups: sci.cryonics From: (Gregory Bloom) Subject: dehydration Message-ID: <> Date: Tue, 1 Jun 93 05:35:24 GMT I was wondering whether dehydration might help reduce the injury from cryosuspension. As I understand it, most of the damage of cryosuspension results from huge osmotic pressure gradients across the cell membrane as pure water freezes and ions concentrate, drawing water out of the cell. This results in damage to the membrane. Also, large pockets of extracellular water freeze and separate cells from one another. Why don't we pre-dehydrate tissues by using a gently increasing hypertonic perfusate prior to freezing? We would reduce cell volume, but by raising the ionic concentration both inside and outside the cell, we make the ratio of intra vs. extra-cellular ionic concentrations closer and less subject to the creation of large osmotic differences across the membrane as the smaller amount of extracellular water freezes. Less water would also decrease the mechanical damage of cell separation. Does this make sense? Has it been tried? Gregory Bloom Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=2289