83 replies to this topic

[nanothan]

Thanks for the links DeadMeat. It would be really sweet if you could cause instant release of the trehalose from microwave or magnetic or electrical stimulation.

I found a few things like this:
Microwave stimulation drug release: http://www.ncbi.nlm..../pubmed/4023179
Electrical stimulation drug release: http://www.seas.upen...erials_2006.PDF

Being able to deliver large molecules to cells is key for cryonics. Once the cause of cryoprotectant toxcity is found, a molecule can be designed to prevent it and then delivered to cells.

I thought of an even better idea than using nanoparticles to deliver AFP genes. How about using a similar system with nanoparticles to deliver hibernation genes! The reduced metabolism during hibernation would prolong life several times, and you would reduce the possibility of destroying consciousness (since we don't know how consciousness works and it may depend on constant electrical activity or something).

Apparently there have been hibernation genes found in humans: http://www.spaceref....news.html?id=81

But even if they are inactive, all you would have to do is deliver hibernation genes the same way Epeius does and trigger the genes to send the cell into hibernation!

Edited by nanothan, 06 December 2010 - 02:25 AM.

[Luke Parrish]

Hibernation is a good anti-aging idea, but it shouldn't be confused with cryonics because the technical differences are so vast. I think long-term hibernation could extend your life by several years (which could help reach escape velocity), but not indefinitely on its own. I think we need to be careful to make the distinction clear for people.

Short-term human hibernation for medical purposes (i.e. for a few hours) is already a mainstream medical practice. One man went into hibernation for 24 days by accident, if I recall correctly. So while not the same thing as cryonics, there seems to be some promise to this approach. Maybe we should give it a separate name... Hiberonics? Hibernetics?

Edited by Luke Parrish, 06 December 2010 - 03:11 PM.

[nanothan]

Hibernation is a good anti-aging idea, but it shouldn't be confused with cryonics because the technical differences are so vast. I think long-term hibernation could extend your life by several years (which could help reach escape velocity), but not indefinitely on its own. I think we need to be careful to make the distinction clear for people.

I wasn't confusing it with cyronics, I know they are different, but there is no forum for hibernation, even though hibernation is far more promising than cyronics. Hibernation can reduce metabolism to a few percent of what it normally is, so it would increase life by a lot more than "several years", logically, if metabolism is a 10% percent of what it normally is, it would seem that life could last 10x longer, which would be more than enough for real anti-aging technology to be developed.

"More realistically, one of the first main benefits of this process could be organ preservation. If you could put organs into long-term stasis, as does a hibernator, you could preserve them for months. At the moment, body organs will only keep for about three or four days. Hibernation could eventually save lives."

quote from http://www.independe...ugh-626287.html

Short-term human hibernation for medical purposes (i.e. for a few hours) is already a mainstream medical practice

reference?

[Luke Parrish]

Hibernation is a good anti-aging idea, but it shouldn't be confused with cryonics because the technical differences are so vast. I think long-term hibernation could extend your life by several years (which could help reach escape velocity), but not indefinitely on its own. I think we need to be careful to make the distinction clear for people.

I wasn't confusing it with cyronics, I know they are different, but there is no forum for hibernation, even though hibernation is far more promising than cyronics. Hibernation can reduce metabolism to a few percent of what it normally is, so it would increase life by a lot more than "several years", logically, if metabolism is a 10% percent of what it normally is, it would seem that life could last 10x longer, which would be more than enough for real anti-aging technology to be developed.

"More realistically, one of the first main benefits of this process could be organ preservation. If you could put organs into long-term stasis, as does a hibernator, you could preserve them for months. At the moment, body organs will only keep for about three or four days. Hibernation could eventually save lives."

quote from http://www.independe...ugh-626287.html

Short-term human hibernation for medical purposes (i.e. for a few hours) is already a mainstream medical practice

reference?

Medical hypothermia:
http://en.wikipedia....tic_hypothermia
http://emedicine.med...902596-overview

Cryonics and hibernation are both wonderful ideas with huge promise for life extension but for different reasons. Hibernation is the nearest-term way to get whole animals to age slower with measurable results. But it has limits that cryonics does not. And unlike cryonics it does not currently exist for humans. It's like SENS, a great idea that we may never live to see. If someone is too old to last until there is a breakthrough in hibernation, cryonics is needed. Note that hibernation would also be subject to years of clinical trials. It wouldn't be very useful for the legally dead by itself. It is a good target for conventional medicine that doesn't have to overcome any fundamental philosophical barriers, and cryonics would definitely benefit from it because of the overlapping sciences. It doesn't make sense to say one has more promise than the other in my opinion -- they promise very different things.

[Mathew Sullivan]

13. Using supercomputers to screen and develop new cryoprotectants link

Again, in regards to the use of supercomputers, please review the subject below.

http://www.worldcomm...putingBasics.do

How Grid Computing Works

Grid Computing: The Basics
Grid computing joins together many individual computers, creating a large system with massive computational power that far surpasses the power of a handful of supercomputers. Because the work is split into small pieces that can be processed simultaneously, research time is reduced from years to months. The technology is also more cost-effective, enabling better use of critical funds.

Changing Our World Now
Grid computing is not a futuristic technology. World Community Grid is at work right now applying this technology to exciting research projects that can benefit us all.

Our first project, Human Proteome Folding, is identifying the proteins produced by human genes. With this information, scientists can understand how defects in proteins can cause disease, making it easier to find cures.

In 2003, with grid computing, in less than three months scientists identified 44 potential treatments to fight the deadly smallpox disease. Without the grid, the work would have taken more than one year to complete.

[nanothan]

Medical hypothermia:
http://en.wikipedia....tic_hypothermia
http://emedicine.med...902596-overview

Cryonics and hibernation are both wonderful ideas with huge promise for life extension but for different reasons. Hibernation is the nearest-term way to get whole animals to age slower with measurable results. But it has limits that cryonics does not. And unlike cryonics it does not currently exist for humans. It's like SENS, a great idea that we may never live to see. If someone is too old to last until there is a breakthrough in hibernation, cryonics is needed. Note that hibernation would also be subject to years of clinical trials. It wouldn't be very useful for the legally dead by itself. It is a good target for conventional medicine that doesn't have to overcome any fundamental philosophical barriers, and cryonics would definitely benefit from it because of the overlapping sciences. It doesn't make sense to say one has more promise than the other in my opinion -- they promise very different things.

I don't think that medical hypothermia is the same thing as hibernation.

[Luke Parrish]

I don't think that medical hypothermia is the same thing as hibernation.

Extended, safe hypothemia is the definition of hibernation that is useful to this context. My point was that a short term version of hibernation (hypothermia) is practiced in hospitals today. If we can replicate what happens in animals, or invent new strategies to lengthen that amount of time, it would be more meaningful to refer to it as hibernation or suspended animation.

[AgeVivo]

any model of toxicity to test at home?

[bgwowk]

any model of toxicity to test at home?

There is a simple test for vitrifiability of cryoprotectant solutions. Prepare a solution of cryoprotectant(s) such as glycerol, DMSO, ethylene glycol or the solute of your choice in water in a test tube. Immerse the test tube in a small bath of methanol (wood alcohol) and dry ice for approximately 15 minutes, then remove it and examine it. At low cryoprotectant concentrations, the solution will turn solid white (freezing). At concentrations near the concentration needed for vitrification, there will ice balls suspended in clear solution. At concentrations at or above the concentration needed for vitrification, the solution will remain completely clear. The concentration of most solutes needed for vitrification is between 40% and 60%, depending on the solute.

Although true vitrification (transition to a solid without freezing) requires temperatures near -120 degC for low molecular weight solutes, observations of ice formation during cooling to dry temperature (-79 degC) in methanol map remarkably well to tests for vitrifiability conducted by cooling test tubes in cold vapor above liquid nitrogen to -130 degC. The only thing you won't see with dry ice testing is devitrification during warming.

Dry ice and methanol are hazardous substances. Dry ice can cause severe frostbite on contact with skin, and methanol is flammable. I'm not encouraging home experimentation, nor do I believe novel discoveries are likely to come from such experiments. I'm just saying as a matter of general interest that this type of test is simple, works, and is interesting to see.

A more elaborate version of this experiment using liquid nitrogen described in the context of a possible science fair project on vitrification is here

http://web.archive.o....cfm?PageId=101

I think that the version using dry ice would work as a lower-level science fair project too.

Edited by bgwowk, 09 December 2010 - 06:40 PM.

[Mathew Sullivan]

Dry ice and methanol are hazardous substances. Dry ice can cause severe frostbite on contact with skin, and methanol is flammable. I'm not encouraging home experimentation, nor do I believe novel discoveries are likely to come from such experiments. I'm just saying as a matter of general interest that this type of test is simple, works, and is interesting to see.

I prefer fluorinert which is a safer alternative to methanol. Depending on the type of fluorinert purchased, there is the downside of cost, evaporation because of a lower boiling point, addition of greenhouse gases to the environment, but a least you don't have to worry about catching yourself on fire. The main thing here is to keep your fluorinert bottled up tight when not in use, and consider using a sharpie to mark the liquid level with the date for monitoring evaporation or loss.

[bgwowk]

Fluorinert won't keep frost off your test tube when you lift it up to see what happened. In every photograph I've ever published of a vitrified solution in a test tube, vial, or flask, the container was coated with methanol.

[drus]

the most important things we should be doing right now to improve cryonics are:

-research into perfecting brain preservation.
-advancing legislation/organizing networks that put cryonicists into a more favourable position to better facilitate a good cryo-preservation.
-moral and ethical/professional accountability/transparency for our organizations and their leaders/directors.
-research into all fields relevant to revival.

the first 3 things are very doable now and would vastly improve cryonics. the 4th is a very slow constantly ongoing process that will likely extend into the next century.

Edited by drus, 09 March 2011 - 07:31 PM.

[Belchement]

The biggest single basic scientific advance that would benefit the science of cryobiology is better understanding and mitigation of cryoprotectant toxicity.

[albedo]

I stand with drus and agree will all his bullets. My very high level perception of the field is that of a fragmented set of people, research and funding. What would be needed is clearly research but the huge delta step will be done when society at large will realized the impact. That is the moment where pressure on politics will be such that the adequate attention will go together with substantial funding and coordinated effort. People need to endorse the effort which mean objectives need to be clearly defined and endorsed with little or no controversy. And society will not endorse if you do not have some philosophical and ethical debate and people become convinced the cause is worth to be followed. Similar considerations could be done for the war against aging. Until people will understand the potentiality and will be a wide endorsement it will be hard to progress beyond the wonders achieved by great scientists in awesome labs around the world. Just my 2 cents ...

[albedo]

I liked this talk by Max More. Maybe a way to progress cryonics is to work with forward thinkers and theologians in the Catholic Church (ev. other "Churchs" as well) to create a vision. This might increase impact and create endorsement by society. What better cause for Catholics than preserving life? They do run already large hospitals to that cause. It can be just an extension of that thinking and, for the believer, with God as the ultimate, asymptotic way of resuscitation. Why they should be against supporting cryonics? A way also for the Church to stay closer and better dialog with Science?

[albedo]

I am not sure this is the right place but as it relates to my last post I wish to point to the interesting perspective in THIS THREAD (started by Aubrey)

[resveratrol_guy]

As explained in this BBC article, brine shrimp can last up to 10,000 years in biostatic suspension, which is not even cryonic because it's at ambient ground temperature. They do this, in large part, by saturating their cells in trehalose, displacing water in the process. (And they don't need DMSO, obviously.) Perhaps some progress could be made by studying how the shrimp are able to utilize this allegedly nonpenetrating cryoprotectant to such great benefit. Maybe they have some pathway which enhances penetration which we could copy pharmacologically.

 

The article also cites this 2009 study which used EGCG plus trehalose to preserve stem cells.

 

Perhaps cryonics is not actually the way to go. Apart from the hazards of ice crystals, it has the disadvantage of too much longterm reliance on refrigeration equipment, with its expense and modest probability of failure. I wonder if we could cool but not freeze the body, using hydrogen sulphide to ease the body into hypoxia, while pumping it with mitochondrial and systemic antioxidants in order to minimize oxidation only transiently, until we could saturate the cells with trehalose, thereby presumably shutting down substantially all biological activity. At that point, we would only need to seal the body in an airtight bag, probably in a noble gas environment, then lock it into a safe for longterm suspension. Yeah, I know this is crazy. But brine shrimp would find it rather unremarkable.

[Rib Jig]

Thanks for starting this thread!

 

All the cryonics improvement in the world

won't mean a thing if its impossible to

revive after death, right???     

 

alive --> cryonics --> revive

alive --> death --> cryonics --> revive

 

The latter is a whole 'nother thing from the former, right??

It doesn't exist in nature, does it??  The former does, e.g., freezing...

 

Therefore, far & away, the best cryonics advance

is to legally allow cryonics whilst still alive, no??

(Oregon is nearest to that now?)

Edited by Rib Jig, 19 December 2015 - 09:58 PM.

[resveratrol_guy]

Thanks for starting this thread!

 

All the cryonics improvement in the world

won't mean a thing if its impossible to

revive after death, right???     

 

alive --> cryonics --> revive

alive --> death --> cryonics --> revive

 

The latter is a whole 'nother thing from the former, right??

It doesn't exist in nature, does it??  The former does, e.g., freezing...

 

Therefore, far & away, the best cryonics advance

is to legally allow cryonics whilst still alive, no??

(Oregon is nearest to that now?)

 

This thread probably deserves more attention than it's been getting in the past 5 years. After all, cryonics or biostasis is more important than even life extension technology.

 

Yeah, obviously our chances of revival would be greater if we entered biostatis before being declared dead. But don't hold your breath and wait for the courts to allow that, at least in the US. We don't even have a word for it yet -- "voluntary autobiostatis"?

[Rib Jig]

alive --> cryonics --> revive

will be allowed, IMO, once it is

demonstrated consistently &

without damage in mammilian

higher forms of life.  Then some

country somewhere will allow

testing on elderly terminal human volunteers...?

Then, with perfected gene therapy youth

morphing in sight (as in, ~20 years away), 

forward-thinking countries will allow

seniors & terminal (alive --> cryonics)

 

but there is ZERO EVIDENCE in nature & labs for 

dead --> cryonics --> revive

right???  all the excitement about cryonic fluid advances is secondary?

getting going on this is primary, IMO:

living terminally-ill-imminent-death-volunteers ---straight away to---> cryonics

 

Edited by Rib Jig, 20 December 2015 - 06:13 PM.

[Danail Bulgaria]

@Rib Jig , this with the terminally ill volunteers may happen in a country, which has allowed eutanasia for terminally ill.

[elfanjo]

Switzerland does already. Shame they have no cryonics facility

[Antonio2014]

This thread probably deserves more attention than it's been getting in the past 5 years.

 

I disagree. Why do you think we laymen can find new ways to improve cryonics? What cryonics researchers need is more money. As simple as that. The way is clear, improve cryoprotectants in order to be less toxic and perfuse more efficiently, and improve nanotechnology in order to be able to do the rewarming and reconstruction.
 

Edited by Antonio2014, 21 December 2015 - 07:37 AM.

[resveratrol_guy]

 

This thread probably deserves more attention than it's been getting in the past 5 years.

 

I disagree. Why do you think we laymen can find new ways to improve cryonics? What cryonics researchers need is more money. As simple as that. The way is clear, improve cryoprotectants in order to be less toxic and perfuse more efficiently, and improve nanotechnology in order to be able to do the rewarming and reconstruction.

 

Brine shrimp have the only biostatis technology that actually works, and it doesn't involve freezing. Just the same, I agree that more funding for conventional cryonic approaches would be a lot better than what we have now, which is too few experts working in this field.

 

The next logical question is where this money is going to come from. Cryonics clients purchasing insurance policies is about the only source, currently. So perhaps what we need is some way to make this an investable proposition, without forcing investors to wait centuries for the results.

 

I would not assume that laymen can't be of help. They lack the embedded assumptions of experts in any given field and might inspire novel approaches.

[Rib Jig]

> What cryonics researchers need is more money...improve cryoprotectants...

 

No!!!  

Bass ackwards!!!     

Revive & the cryoprotectants will follow...

$$$ for revivals!!!!

Get beyond the planaria & nemotodes!

Research dollars, grants towards reviving vertebrates, mammals!!

(cryoprotectant improvements weaved into revival research)

[Danail Bulgaria]

So, the researchers have to make successfull revive for the cryoprotectants to follow and fundings to come.

Well, this is a closed cycle:

 

Don't receive money until revival

Don't produce revival until receive money

 

[Antonio2014]

Brine shrimp have the only biostatis technology that actually works, and it doesn't involve freezing.

 

No, it doesn't work:

 

- First of all, we aren't brine shrimp eggs.

 

- Secondly, your link doesn't prove anything. The book they reference is not visible, so nothing is known about their methods (particularly, how they avoided contamination of samples).

 

This is another example of why laymen can't discover new ways to improve cryonics.
 

Edited by Antonio2014, 25 December 2015 - 12:22 PM.

[resveratrol_guy]

 

Brine shrimp have the only biostatis technology that actually works, and it doesn't involve freezing.

 

No, it doesn't work:

 

- First of all, we aren't brine shrimp eggs.

 

- Secondly, your link doesn't prove anything. The book they reference is not visible, so nothing is known about their methods (particularly, how they avoided contamination of samples).

 

This is another example of why laymen can't discover new ways to improve cryonics.

 

You're right: it doesn't prove anything. It's merely an alternative idea with some low quality supporting evidence. But it does show a pathway by which laymen might improve biostatis, with or without employing cryonics: there are many potential solutions to this problem, and experts on cryoprotectants are only looking at one class of them.

 

For that matter, Geekhere is another layman with another potentially useful idea: use some sort of electromagnetic effect to interfere with ice crystal formation, presumably until we reach the vitrification temperature of water, at which water is an amorphous solid like window glass. Perhaps nuclear magnetic resonance or heavy water might be of assistance, for that matter.

 

Clearly, less than 1% of the scientists in this world are cryonics experts. I would bet that the remaining 99% could combine their ingenuity in novel ways to come up with a solution to the problem sooner. You can argue, quite correctly, that those 99% are not funded to do so. But frankly the 1% aren't well funded, either. So I think what we need here is an X Prize for animal resurrection. Nothing else will provide the resources to take the required risks, if in fact it's possible at all.

Edited by resveratrol_guy, 25 December 2015 - 03:39 PM.

[Rib Jig]

Cryonics could be dead end if NO

alive --> dead --> frozen --> revived

in nature.

 

Answer may be dessication +

nonreducing sugar trehalose

a la tardigrade (moss bear)...

Its also only animal surviving

OUTSIDE space craft & can

self-repair radiation-damaged DNA!!!!!!!!!

[Rib Jig]

1. anyone going into cryonics is not gone
2. Look at nature for if there is a animal that is alive, frozen, then revived."

 

 

1. Wrong, wrong wrong!!!!        All cryonized humans have died first.

2. Meaningless!!!!  Do this to humans & it is MURDER!!!