Cure for Death explored

[brandonbull]

Originally posted by: IGBT
..great article. many of the researchers doing this kind of study are on shoestring budgets. This is where the research dollars need to go not politically drivin scams like global warming.

Oh noes!!!!! That is heresy. We can't burn you at the stake anymore due to global warming, but Lord Al Gore, the keeper of all things global warming, shall curse you forever.

 

[Accipiter22]

interesting. Study was very small though, and given the size of the sample groups statistical power was probably very low

 

[brandonbull]

Originally posted by: IGBT
..great article. many of the researchers doing this kind of study are on shoestring budgets. This is where the research dollars need to go not politically drivin scams like global warming.

Or the "War in Iraq"

 

[oztrailrider]

That is amazing, it's incredible what you discover when you just look at things differently. Let's hope they have success with it.

 

[TheVrolok]

Originally posted by: sicko
Damn, I was hoping I can sign up with the I want to live forever club.

<Queen> Who wants to live foreevvver? </Queen>


Pretty interesting discovery. Shall be interesting to see where it goes.

 

[Rachael]

Zombies, anyone? *worried looks*

 

[AgentJean]

interesting indeed.
Although I'm still waiting until 2050 when I'll be able to download my brain into a computer. I'm hoping by then we have cybernetic bodies to go with the computer brains.

 

[AgentJean]

Originally posted by: Rachael
Zombies, anyone? *worried looks*

At least they are not playing with a virus to keep the cell from dying or removing a cells requirement for oxygen.

 

[Strk]

Originally posted by: AgentJean
interesting indeed.
Although I'm still waiting until 2050 when I'll be able to download my brain into a computer. I'm hoping by then we have cybernetic bodies to go with the computer brains.

Asgard ftw

Because once the cells have been without oxygen for more than five minutes, they die when their oxygen supply is resumed.

That's nutty.

 

[NikolaeVarius]

So basically, basics we have learned in medical science, that we have to get blood to the body as fast as possible to spread oxygen, has been killing our patients?

 

[KarenMarie]

amazing!!

 

[EKKC]

Zombies FTW

 

[xSauronx]

Originally posted by: tenshodo13
So basically, basics we have learned in medical science, that we have to get blood to the body as fast as possible to spread oxygen, has been killing our patients?

Whats just as interesting to me, and I dont have the article handy to expand on it right now, is that some other researchers have learned that an initial loss of oxygen isnt always deadly, but can basically put things into a coma of sorts if its a very rapid induction of a gas besides oxygen, and they hoped it might be possible to do this in a controlled way,after more research, with humans (perhaps for long trips, space voyages, i cant recall, my memory sucks)

This months National Geographic has an article that brings the point up, in a way. Its about bulldog-ants. To study them, some researchers would blow a jet of CO2 or some such into a nest to put them to "Sleep" so they could start digging to find the queen.

Wish I could remember where I found this at :/ Otherwise it just sounds nutty, but it was *quite* interesting.

Heres the National Geographic article about the ants at least.

 

[Raiden256]

This would basically explain the whole boy falls in a lake, drowns, then is rescusitated (sp? no idea...) much later scenario.

 

[Fritzo]

However, the side effect of being cured of death is having green skin, a flat head, bolts in your neck, huge scars, and a tendancy to walk with your arms stretched out ahead of you while grunting "uuuuuggghhhhh!"

 

[Triumph]

or the persistent craving for brains.

 

[OS]

Originally posted by: Triumph
or the persistent craving for brains.

:Q

 

[ViviTheMage]

woah!

 

[Dumac]

Originally posted by: Fritzo
However, the side effect of being cured of death is having green skin, a flat head, bolts in your neck, huge scars, and a tendancy to walk with your arms stretched out ahead of you while grunting "uuuuuggghhhhh!"

I think I would have liked Mary Shelley's Frankenstein more if her monster was like that.

 

[everman]

Zombie survival kit, check!

 

[Eli]

That article just blew my mind.

I know we have some ER people that post, I'd really like to see what they think about this.

Edit: This needs some serious ++study.

The research takes them deep into the machinery of the cell, to the tiny membrane-enclosed structures known as mitochondria where cellular fuel is oxidized to provide energy. Mitochondria control the process known as apoptosis, the programmed death of abnormal cells that is the body's primary defense against cancer. "It looks to us," says Becker, "as if the cellular surveillance mechanism cannot tell the difference between a cancer cell and a cell being reperfused with oxygen. Something throws the switch that makes the cell die."

If thats true, that means it would probably be something "wrong" with the P53 cancer suppressor gene. We could probably eventually "fix" it.

I put those words in quotes because we don't know enough about it all to really know... I'm sure its a very complex process, and in all likelyhood their guess is probably wrong even if it's on the right track.

This could eventually lead to being able to "kill" someone for a period of time, and then bring them back as if nothing happened - suspended animation.

I suspect that we're getting close to having to ask, "what is death?". If we're really able to revive even 50% of people that have died of natural causes - even an hour after they've died, that would be amazing. Where would it end? People could be jumpstarted over and over again. It would just be when an organ was so far gone that it just simply didn't work anymore - and that we couldn't replace - that you would actually die.

And even at that point, you wouldn't really be "dead". Sticking someone in the fridge probably just stretches it out.

Sure does make it all weird.

 

[nakedfrog]

It just so happens your friend here is only mostly dead.

 

[her209]

Wouldn't the enzymes breakdown?

 

[OFFascist]

Intersting.

Considering that I'm studying to be an EMT, once this is advanced further it would definately change my field quite a bit.

 

[TraumaRN]

My only worry about this article...and considering that I work in a Level 1 Trauma Center...arguably one of the better ones in the country...is that people will hear about this and get false hope thing going. It looks good so far and at least for sudden cardiac arrest, but how it's gonna work out for someone having a stroke who has sudden cardiac arrest. Or gunshot wounds, stab wounds etc. Does this sort of treatment help with that as well? Because the unfortunate thing is that sudden cardiac arrest is usually CAUSED by something else...I guess I'll have to read this study in depth