X-Message-Number: 4487 Date: Thu, 8 Jun 1995 20:41:30 -0400 From: "Keith F. Lynch" <> Subject: Internal radiation writes: > I haven't checked the numbers or done the arithmetic, but I have a > vague impression that worth-while information might be obtained by > recording the natural radiation from a frozen patient, over extended > time. If it requires an extremely destructive amount of external radiation to gather sufficiently detailed information, as it appears to, then it seems to me that it would require an equally destructive amount of internal radiation to gather the same information. This amount would probably require many millions of years (if not forever, since internal radioactivity does gradually decrease with time). > Natural radiation, of course, is not completely non-destructive, but > it is unavoidable in any case. I think it is pretty much harmless over typical cryonic time scales (30 to 300 years). But it's not true that it's unavoidable. Most of it comes from potassium 40. If the patient were to consume K-40 depleted potassium for several weeks before suspension, that should greatly reduce their internal radioactivity. C-14 depleted carbon would also help, and is more easily obtained. Not that I think either is worth doing. Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=4487