X-Message-Number: 2498
From:  (Thomas Donaldson)
Subject: SCI.CRYONICS Re: High Temperature Cryonics
Date: Mon, 20 Dec 1993 23:59:37 -0800 (PST)


There were attempts to use such cryoprotectants as sucrose, yes. Their main
problem is that they did not enter the cells and so did not provide sufficient
protection. 

HOWEVER, if Douglas Skrecky wishes to do REAL EMPIRICAL work on suspensions,
he's welcome to try to method he proposes. It's true that in detail it has
not been tried before, and so it's hard to criticise except by referring to
other experiments which don't quite match it and so can always be said not
to apply. The best test, of course, is successful preservation of a brain.
And as a cryonicist, I will let Douglas decide what "success" is to be
within wide limits. But those limits are not infinite: I would want some
evidence that at least the required information for revival continues to
exist. As a simple test, we might try first to preserve a suspension of
living cells rather than a whole tissue. That would, of course, require a lot
less funding than attempts to preserve any kind of tissue, and still less
than attempts to preserve an organ.

I hope that my problem with Mr. Skrecky's proposal is clear from these
comments.
			Thomas Donaldson

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