X-Message-Number: 6878
Date: Wed, 11 Sep 1996 13:12:44 -0400 (EDT)
From: Charles Platt <>
Subject: Prometheus/Visser

As a pledger to the Prometheus Project, I made my theoretical commitment 
merely because I want to see a job get done. I don't care who does it. I 
don't care how they do it. I believe all pledgers feel the same way, and 
I am quite bemused by Bob Ettinger's seeming assumption that this is an 
"either/or" proposition with one group of people on one side, another 
group on another side, and a big gap in between. Do you honestly suppose 
that any of us would refuse to use a life-saving technology simply 
because it emerged from research sponsored by a competing organization? I 
have absolutely no doubt that if Visser's work is applicable to the goal 
of reversible brain cryopreservation, the Prometheus Project will build 
on this foundation eagerly. Indeed, I wouldn't support the Project if it 
refused to take advantage of this opportunity.

Having said that however I must add that so far, from where I sit, the
Visser report does not give me reason, yet, to hope for a breakthrough. 
If I can see light-microscope and electron-microscope photographs of
brains treated with her perfusate, showing less damage than was visible in
the pictures supplied last year by Mike Darwin (published in CryoCare
Report) which represent the current best achievement in this area, then I
will be extremely excited. Till then, there is no way for me to evaluate
the significance of the work on rat hearts. Since Luyet was able to
restore pieces of rat hearts with really very primitive techniques more
than 25 years ago, I have to assume that the rat heart happens to be (for
whatever reason) a relatively easy organ to perfuse and revive. And 
that's about as far as my lay-person knowledge of cryobiology takes me.

We must also remember that Suda managed to detect electrical activity in
cat brains that had been frozen, some for as long as a year. These kinds
of dramatic experiments demonstrated long ago that life processes in cells
can restart after periods at low temperatures. The issue is now, as it was
then, DAMAGE REDUCTION. I really want to believe that the Visser work
promises damage reduction in the cryopreservation of human (or animal)
brains. But in the absence of an appropriate experiment, properly
documented, with accompanying photos, how can I believe this, except on
faith? 

--CP


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