X-Message-Number: 6467
Date: 07 Jul 96 19:08:38 EDT
From: "Steven B. Harris" <>
Subject: CRYONICS:Frozen Heart Claims

In message #6433 Date: 03 Jul 96 06:44:39 EDT A DOLINOFF <100676-
> writes:
 
   >>Referring to the information posted by Dirk du Plessis #
5674 Jan 1996, stating that VISSER's article on rat heart
cryopreservation was rejected by CRYOBIOLOGY seems 
to be incorrect. The LONDON SUNDAY TIMES of 19th May 1996 (page
15, main section, by Lois Rogers, medical correspondent) confirms
after speaking to David PEGG, Editor of CRYOBIOLOGY, that
VISSER's article is due to be published later this year. 
I have managed to locate Mrs Olga VISSER, who confirmed that the
article was never rejected, as stated by du Plessis, but had been
returned for additional information in February and again in June
this year. Mrs Olga VISSER informed me that to date she has 
successfully frozen/thawed 45 rats to 77 KELVINS (minus 196 deg
C) with her technique. Hopefully, we shall see publication of
this article in the near future ! <<

   Comment: Rats??  If the woman claims to have gotten whole rats
back from 77 K, she's no doubt a charlatan.   Even rat *hearts*
are pretty hard to believe.  I don't like hearing the evil name
of the London Sunday Times, either-- it's a tabloid familiar to
me from their insistence that AIDS is not caused by a virus, and
their claim that those who say it is, are part of a great
conspiracy.  I put them one step down from the Weekly World News.

   If anyone wonders why CRYOBIOLOGY is wary of such claims as
we've so far heard regarding these LN2 treated hearts, it's not
hard to figure out.  They're afraid of getting burned by people
who are just plain liars.  Give me a nutty visionary any time, so
long has he or she is an *honest* nutty visionary.  It's the
plain vanilla *dishonest* Soviet-style researchers with the 
unrepeatable results, who I really cannot abide.


                                  Steve Harris, M.D.


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