ISSN 0964-5659

Longevity Report 61

Volume 11 no 61. First published September 1997. ISSN 0964-5659.

e-mail: Internet longevityrpt@yahoo.com

Complacency John de Rivaz

Changes Chrissie Loveday

Genetic Manipulation of Lifespan John K Clark

Fly Experiments Douglas Skrecky

Mice Longevity Database Douglas Skrecky

Cryonics or Mere Freezing? Yvan Bozzonetti

Hot Cryonics Douglas Skrecky

Antibiotics and the Fruit Fly Experiments Yvan Bozzonetti

What Does the Future Hold for Revived People? Roger L. Bagula

Single copy rate 3.50. Subscription rates six issues of 20 pages:- 20 (15 by Banker's Order UK only). Cheques in British Pounds should be drawn on a UK bank and should be made payable to "Reeves Telecommunications Laboratories" Alternatively, dollar checks for $34 can be accepted if drawn on a U.S. bank and made payable to "J. de Rivaz". Contents are provided for information only, under the right to free speech. Opinions are the authors' own. No professional advice is intended. If you wish others to be legally responsible for your health, life or finances, then please consult a professional regulated according to the laws of your country.

Complacency

Editorial, by John de Rivaz

When I started Longevity Report the intention was not to earn money selling subscriptions, but to get like minded people together to provide life extension and cryonics services in the UK. When Longevity Report started there was

• No company in the UK importing and supplying the Life Extension Foundation's vitamins.
• No organisation at all providing links to the cryonics organisations (all in the USA)
• No organisation willing to accept a trust account for cryonics purposes

Now we have Supernutrition Ltd (Formerly Life Extension Products Ltd, then Life Plus Ltd) supplying the leading LEF products. We have representation of two cryonics organisations - Alcor and the Cryonics Institute - for UK residents to chose from. A leading firm of US stockbrokers with London offices will accept accounts in a US style revocable trust suitable for Cryonics Institute membership. In addition, the UK Inland Revenue have declared these to be "bare trusts", which means they receive the same tax treatment as though the underlying investments were still in the owner's name. If they were any other sort of trust, the taxation would be more onerous.

Maybe all of this would have happened without the existence of Longevity Report. It is hard to tell. It certainly would have come later in time, that is to be sure.

However I have headed this "complacency" because nothing new has happened for some time. Sure there are things I would like to have happened, such as

• A method devised to enable longevist people in any local area to attract members for self help etc.
• A method devised where people can have a "reanimation account" specialising in equity investments in technology companies, rather than fixed interest as is currently available.
• A method of cryonics funding available to people without much money to invest which nevertheless takes advantage of the investment potential of the technology boom.
• Some movement towards the provision of a complete storage and preparation service in the UK.

I have tried local advertising of Longevity Report for an extended period, with no result. I have written at length in cryonics periodicals and on the Internet re the benefits of technology investment that are specific to and to the advantage of cryonics people. The final item will only be achievable when there are considerably more people signed up.

All I can do now is to continue to provide the medium for people with these interests to communicate. I will try not to be complacent and continue to use whatever opportunity arises to achieve these goals.

Changes

by Chrissie Loveday

A machine that flies? ... Don't be ridiculous.

Cars for anyone to drive themselves? ... Too dangerous.

Machines to do the washing? ... Why on earth do we need those?

All day entertainment on personal television and radio?...That really stretches the imagination.

Computers in most homes? ... Quite out of the question.

Most of us have accepted all of those, even expect them and feel cheated if we are deprived of them. The thought is unacceptable, the reality something quite different. I remember saying I would simply stop driving my car when the price of petrol reached fifty pence (ten shillings as it was then). When it reached a pound per gallon, I cut down on my journeys, but now it's touching almost three pounds a gallon, I have accepted it as necessary to my way of life. As for the rest, I am in a state of near panic if the washer breaks down; get quite nasty if a favourite programme gets lost in the summer sport obsession that grips the TV programmers; feel as if my life support is cut off, should my computer crash.

Is accepting change an age thing? For me, it can't be. I am a granny for heavens sake! Grannies aren't supposed to change with the times, according to urban myth. If it isn't age, it must be an attitude of mind. I like routine, of a sort but that is mainly to enable me to fit in all the things I want to do. But I like a routine than can easily be adapted to cope with unexpected things (or people) turning up, otherwise, you miss out on too many experiences. It is all to do with accepting changes and making the most of the good things. I'm all in favour of recycling materials, generally being green in my attitude to our world's diminishing resources, as far as possible. I want to accept the positive things without condemning the things I dislike as automatically wrong.

Thinking of the future, one is faced with a bleak image, if the sci-fi writers are to be believed. Why are so many films about the future shot in almost total darkness with characters wearing black or camouflage type uniforms? We may be hastening towards a destruction scenario but surely, even a few of today's colourful textiles should survive? There may be much to criticise about today's society, such as violence, lack of honesty and the grab-what-you-can-get-culture. But is it so very different from the good old days? In those good old days the media and communications weren't so in your face as they are today. Listen to old broadcasts, tapes or read old newspapers. Do the folk, who are so convinced that everything was much better then, really have an accurate memory about what it was really like? Or is it more a case of all the summers were sunny when we were young?

What of the coming changes? As far as I can see, we should be healthier in the future, because of the progress in medical research: we should live longer, again through research, a healthier attitude to life and better nutrition. As far as technology goes, there are endless possibilities. The last fifty years have paved a way for us and we can stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before, enhance and develop what they taught us. We all realise that such items as computers are probably obsolete before we have finished unwrapping them. I already take for granted that my own machine is hundreds of times better than the technology that landed men on the moon.

What lies round the corner is always exciting. If I ever stop being interested in things, I shall know that it's time to pack up and decide to get old. I'm still convinced that it will be well worth having a shot at cryonic suspension. I'll never get to grips with everything I want to do in this life and this at least gives me a better chance. So, it may not work but scientists are a determined bunch, always wanting to achieve the impossible. Which brings me back to the beginning of this piece.

Aeroplanes: cars: washing machines: television: computers. They were impossible dreams once upon a time.

by John K Clark <johnkc@well.com>

A year or two ago a gene was found in the roundworm C.elegans that if mutated allowed the worm to live 8 times its normal life span. This is not quite as exciting as it seems because the mutation also slowed down everything in the animal about 8 times. In the issue of the journal Science of August 18,1997 Dr. Gary Ruvkum found that if he made a change in another gene, called daf-2, the worm lived 3 times as long but without slowing the animal down and putting it into a general torpor.

Ruvkum also found the daf-2 gene in humans and 35% of it is identical to the one in worms. In humans daf-2 codes for a protein in the outer wall of cells that is the receptor for insulin. Insulin is just information, it tells cells how much glucose to metabolize. The products of this metabolism are free radicals and other nasty things thought by many to be responsible for aging and the reason that animals on a very reduced diet live longer. People with non-insulin dependent diabetes also have a mutation in their daf-2 gene, although it's not know if it's the same one Ruvkum produced, these people can make insulin but can't use it efficiently, they don't live longer and that's puzzling. Maybe the extra glucose in the blood is more detrimental than other effects are helpful or maybe another mutation or another gene is involved, but I think it's hopeful and I'm not the only one.

Longevity expert Dr. Caleb E Finch of The University of Southern California says "I think it's a gorgeous piece of work[...] the bottom line is that there may be fundamental mechanisms that prevail among all multicellular organisms and that may be very informative in managing human aging. [...] as we learn more about the specific behaviour of genes that predispose to health problems we will be able to modify many aspects of aging".

Fly Experiments

by Douglas Skrecky

This is the eleventh update on my fly experiments. The most recent results are as follows:

Currently the highest survival is in the bottle containing purple yam(58%), followed by a tie for second between paprika(43%) & anise(43%), followed by amchoor(42%), malt(34%), and then melatonin(31%) & activated charcoal(31%).

The control bottle has a low survival of just 14%. Possibly the higher seasonal temperatures in my apartment have reduced control survival. By comparison control survival was 25% on the day 42 census of the second run. In addition to accelerating the aging process in flies higher temperatures also may encourage bacteria growth in the 4-24 medium I use. Since I am not changing the medium at all pathogens are lifely a major limiting factor in the survivals of my flies. Starting with the fourth run I will be taking some further action against this.

The dose does make the poison. Although a low dosage of bactericidal sage increases survival, higher dosages are quite toxic, possibly because of thujone poisoning. Melatonin was something of a disappointment. Although a low dosage increased fly life span, the highest dosage was toxic for reasons unknown. The results for tumerin, which is problably the most powerful DNA protectant in existance were very disappointing. Activated carbon has extended the remaining life span of old rodents by an impressive 47.3%. (Experimental Gerontology 19: 217-225 1984) It seems to be helpful for flies as well.

The day 17 results for anise are in some doubt. Although the day 36 total fly count for most bottles was quite close to that of the day 17 count, one major exception was for anise. On day 17 I tabulated 11 flies, while on day 36 this was increased to 21! There is no evidence of reproduction in either this or any other bottle used in the third run, due to the presence of the taurine larvicide I mix in the medium. The bottle is completely sealed with cardboard so nothing can get in or out. My best guess is that I somehow had a brain aneurism while writing down the live count as 5, instead of 15 on day 17. In any case the day 36 survival of 43% (9 alive & 12 dead) still stands.

The high survivals of purple yam(58%), paprika(43%), anise(43%) and amchoor(42%) are all very intriguing. I have no idea why these supplements seem to be helpful. To be frank I am not completely convinced any of them really are helpful since these results could still be by chance. These supplements will have to further prove themselves by consistently increasing survival in several experiments before I short list them as longevity extenders for flies. However if anyone has any information about purple yam in particular I would be most grateful to hear from you. A medline search using the terms "purple yam" was negative.

This is the thirteenth update on my fly experiments. The most recent results are as follows:

Third Run	Survival
Supplement DAY:	17	36	48	59
Control	64%	14%	0%	0%
Activated charcoal	87	31	15	4
Amchoor	73	42	8	0
Angelica	56	18	0	0
Anise	45	43	19	4
Bay	69	0	0	0
Beet	62	0	0	0
Betaine HCL	82	27	0	0
Carrot	40	0	0	0
Celery seed	90	0	0	0
Citrus bioflavonoids	65	5	0	0
Comfrey	88	0	0	0
Dill seed	82	0	0	0
Green pea	76	8	0	0
Hydroxycitric acid	47	0	0	0
Kelp	64	7	12	0
Malt	83	34	18	3
Melatonin	54	31	6	0
Melatonin 2X	70	29	6	0
Melatonin 4X	65	6	0	0
Nicotinamide 6X	28	0	0	0
Paprika	69	43	29	7
Para-aminobenzoic acid	82	17	11	0
Purple yam	92	58	8	0
Rosehip	88	6	6	0
Sage	66	19	7	3
Sage 2X	67	0	0	0
Sage 4X	94	0	0	0
Silica	88	7	0	0
Spinach	40	20	0	0
Tumerin	84	0	0	0

Paprika still leads the pack with a 7% survival on day 59, followed by anise (4%), activated charcoal (4%), malt (3%) and sage (3%). All flies in the other bottles are dead. Seeing that the lowest dosage of sage offered the best survival it is possible that even lower dosages may offer better results.

One of the items I record in my workbook that I usually do not include in these updates is the smell of the bottles when I am cleaning them out after using them in a run. I do this to monitor for supplements with good antibacterial properties. Only the bottle containing para-aminobenzoic acid thus far has had no smell. So it is possible that this might be a good additive to the fly food to prevent it from rotting.

Certainly para-aminobenzoic acid is far less toxic than most of the bactericides being tested in run #4. Curiously it is the control bottle that is maintaining 100% survival so far. This is actually what SHOULD happen in the absence of pathogens. However I am surprised by this since diseased breeding bottles were used to provide flies for the fourth run.

All of the supplements tested in several doses have always exhibited the highest survival at the lowest dosage used. This is making me suspect that I am overdosing my flies with supplements.

Fourth Run	Survival
Supplement	Alive	dead	Day 10
Control	9	0	100%
bactine	6	2	75
bactine 4X	4	4	50
garlic	1	4	20
garlic 4X	0	12	0
KCL	9	0	100
KCL 4X	5	2	71
mint listerine	0	10	0
mint listerine 4X	0	8	0
paprika	7	1	88
paprika 4X	4	4	50
pectin	2	3	40
plax	9	6	60
plax 4X	0	20	0
purple yam	18	3	86
purple yam 4X	11	10	52
salt	7	8	47
salt 4X	3	5	38
sterisol	0	9	0
sterisol 4X	0	7	0
viadent	0	7	0
viadent 4X	0	12	0
water reduced 50%	9	1	90

This is the fourteenth update on my fly experiments. On day 73 I checked the third run for survivors and found none. However after smelling the activated charcoal, anise, malt, paprika bottles while cleaning them I discovered that none of these smelt bad, indicating that it was the lack of pathogens in these bottles that was at least partly responsible for their life extending effects. The sage bottle had a slight smell.

The fourth run was something of a disaster. I intended to find a non-toxic bactericide here, but failed badly. The lesson I learnt is that by using harsh chemicals to kill bacteria, you can kill flies as well. As I washed some bottles on day 34 I noticed that the control bottle smelled bad, the paprika and purple yam 4X bottles smelled a little better, but the salt bottle had no odor. Only 1 fly each still lives in the purple yam and water reduced bottles.

With the fifth run I decided to try some nontoxic bactericides. After reading up on books on food preservation I learnt that high enough concentrations of sugars can inhibit bacterial growth. I think it may have been the maltose in malt from run #3 that was acting to inhibit bacteria. I am also testing sucrose (table sugar), glucose and sorbitol to see how these fare as well. I am retesting activated charcoal, anise, malt, and paba.

Rather than continue with my testing of spices I decided to try something different - and more expensive - amino acids. I also managed to obtain some l-carnosine after much begging. The reason for my interest in l-carnosine is that it has been found to rejuvenate the morphology of senescent cell cultures that have reached their hayflick limit and can not divide anymore. Neither d-carnosine (b-alanyl-d-histidine), homocarnosine, anserine nor b-alanine share this curious effect. (Experimental Cell Research 212: 167-175 1994) L-carnosine reduces DNA oxidation. (Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications 223: 278-282 1996) L-carnosine inhibits glycosylation. (FEBS Letters 371:81-85 1995) Unfortunately shortly after recieving some l-carnosine I found out that it probably will not work to extend life span in flies since it is unlikely to be absorbed intact. It will probably act as a very expensive source of b-alanine and l-histidine for my flies. In order for l-carnosine to be absorbed it has to be administered in the form of acetylcarnosine, which I don't believe is commercially available. (Clinica Chimica Acta 254: 1-21 1996) B-alanine has been tested in flies with negative results on life span and l-histidine has been tested in rodents with negative results as well.

For the first time I am running several control bottles so as to achieve a more stable comparison group. FYI: I use a lot (20 grams) of 4-24 dry fly medium per bottle, partly because I bought a lot of it a while back and partly because I lack the means to accurately weigh small quantities of fly food and supplements. I mention the weights of the supplements here only if the bottle they are from specifies how much 1/4 teaspoon weighs. My own guessimates have been notoriously inaccurate in the past, since the same volume of different powders can have quite different weights. This lack of rigour is not a fatal defect for cheap screening experiments, but would have to be rectified for serious experimentation. All published fly longevity experiments are done in a temperature regulated environment and use age-synchronized flies. I don't have air-conditioning and use most flies from several breeding bottles, which at least are all started on the same date. For this run I am using new breeding bottles, that have not (yet) shown much evidence of bacterial contamination.

Fifth Run
Supplement:	Quantity
Control 1
Control 2
Control 3
activated charcoal:	1 capsule (260 mg) / 20 grams 4-24 medium
activated charcoal 4X:	4 capsules (1040 mg)
l-alanine:	1/4 teaspoon (1050 mg)
l-alanine 4X:	1 teaspoon (4200 mg)
anise:	1/4 teaspoon
anise 4X:	1 teaspoon
l-carnosine:	1/8 teaspoon
l-carnosine 2X:	1/4 teaspoon
l-carnosine 4X:	1/2 teaspoon
l-carnosine 8X:	1 teaspoon
l-cysteine:	1/4 teaspoon
l-cysteine:	1 teaspoon
glucose:	1/4 teaspoon
glucose 4X:	1 teaspoon
l-glycine:	1/4 teaspoon
l-glycine 4X:	1 teaspoon
l-glutamine:	1 capsule (500 mg)
l-glutamine 4X:	4 capsules (2000 mg)
l-isoleucine:	1/4 teaspoon
l-isoleucine 4X:	1 teaspoon
l-leucine:	1/4 teaspoon
l-leucine 4X:	1 teaspoon
malt:	1/4 teaspoon
malt 4X:	1 teaspoon
paba:	1 capsule (250 mg) *
paba 4X:	4 capsules (1000 mg) root and beet powder)
dl-phenylalanine:	1 capsule (500 mg)
dl-phenylalanine:	4 capsules (2000 mg)
l-proline:	1 capsule (500 mg)
l-proline 4X:	4 capsules (2000 mg)
sorbitol:	1/4 teaspoon
sorbitol 4X:	1 teaspoon
sucrose:	1/4 teaspoon
sucrose 4X:	1 teaspoon
l-threonine:	1/4 teaspoon (850 mg)
l-threonine 4X:	1 teaspoon (3400 mg)
l-valine:	1/4 teaspoon (750 mg)
l-valine 4X:	1 teaspoon (3000 mg)

* note: paba capsules also contain dandelion

C57BL/6J Mice Longevity Database

Updated by Doug Skrecky 31 July, 1997

The following database lists the effect of various interventions on average life span of C57BL/6J mice. Terms used: CR(Caloric Restriction), PR(Protein Restriction), VR(Vitamin Restriction), MR(Mineral Restriction), EOD(fed Every Other Day). A plus sign added to a period means that the intervention continued till death. Thus 12+ means the intervention started at 12 months and lasted till all of the animals had died. The ~ sign usually means that where average life span is not tabulated in a reference, it is estimated from graphs and the percentage change from controls is calculated from this estimate.

The advantage of considering only a single strain (C57BL/6J) of mice is that a meaningful comparison can be made between various intervention groups and the Longest Lived Control (LLC) group from all of the experiments. This amounts to 34.3 months for a control group from reference 20. I hope this will put in perspective the meaning of many of the beneficial interventions. No intervention has significantly increased the average life span over that of the LLC control group. For example the male control mice in the pantothenic acid experiment lived on average 18.6 months. The pantothenic acid doped male mice lived 22 months on average, for an 18% increase. However compared to 34.3 months or the LLC group this is still a 36% decrease. One can not conclude that pantothenic acid will increase life span in healthy controls, since all that has been demonstrated is that this vitamin helps reduce the mortality rate of unhealthy mice. The same can be said for all of the other interventions including caloric restriction.

Several factors may account for variations in control mice life span. These include the failure to house the animals individually, feeding Purina chow, which hs toxic levels of aluminum (Age 14:53-56 1991), and failure to maintain proper sanitation. Research with other rodent strains have found that substitution of starch for sucrose in the diet, and substitution of either soybean or whey protein for casein results in increased life span. On an additional speculative note the substitution of high amylose starch for low amylose starch may further increase life span since this has been found to retard the development of adult onset diabetes in rodents. It is very likely that proper attention to all these factors would increase control life span beyond than of the current LLC group. This was singlely housed, but was fed casein protein and 72% sucrose/28% cornstarch for the carbohydrate.

1 Dietary Vitamin C Improves the Survival of Mice Gerontology 30: 371-375 1984

2 Effect of Pantothenic Acid on the Longevity of Mice Proceedings of the Society for Experimental Biology and Medicine 99(3): 632-633 December 1958

3 Favorable Effects of Pyridoxine HCL on the Aging Process of C57BL/6J Mice AGE 5(4): 143 October 1982

4 Effect of Dietary B-Carotene on the Survival of Young and Old Mice Gerontology 32: 189-195 1986

5 Excessive Intake of Copper: Influence on Longevity and Cadmium Accumulation in Mice Mechanisms of Ageing and Development 26: 195-203 1984

6 Effect of Antioxidents on Life-Span of C57BL Mice Journal of Gerontology 26(3): 378-380 1971

7 Effects of Various Drugs on Longevity in Female C57BL/6J Mice Gerontologia 19: 271-280 1973

8 The Effects of Prolonged Coffee Intake on Genetically Identical Mice Life Sciences 21(1): 63-70 1977

9 The Effect of Dietary Methionine on the Copper Content of Tissues and Survival of Young and Old Mice Experimental Gerontology 19: 393-399 1984

10 Favorable Effects of the Antioxidents Sodium and Magnesium Thiazolidine Carboxylate on the Vitality and Life Span of Drosophilia and Mice Experimental Gerontology 14: 279-285 1979

11 62 The Pineal Control of Aging: The Effects of Melatonin and Pineal Grafting on the Survival of Older Mice Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1: 291-313 1991

12 The Effect of Dietary Vitamin, Protein and Intake Levels on the Life Span of Mice of Different Ages Age 8: 13-17 January 1985

13 Effect of Exercise on Longevity, Body Weight, Locomotor Performance and Passive-Avoidance Memory of C57BL/6J Mice Neurobiology of Aging 6: 17-24 1985

14 A Longitudinal Study of Tolerance to Cold Stress Among C57BL/6J Mice Journal of Gerontology 40(1): 8-14 1985

15 Dietary Restriction in Mice Beginning at 1 Year of Age: Effect on Life-Span and Spontaneous Cancer Incidence Science 215: 1415-1418 1982

16 Effects of Food Restriction on Aging: Separation of food Intake and Adiposity Proc. Natl. Acad. USA 81: 1835-1838 1984

17 Effects of Intermittent Feeding Upon Body Weight and Lifespan in Inbred Mice: Interaction of Genotype and Age Mechanisms of Ageing and Development 55:69-87 1990

18 Genetic Differences in Effects of Food Restriction on Aging in Mice Journal of Nutrition 117: 376-382 1987

19 Effect of Dietary Cellulose on Life Span and Biochemical Variables of Male Mice Age 11(1): 7-9 1988

20 Survival and Disease Patterns in C57BL/6J Mice Subjected to Undernutrition Experimental Gerontology 15: 237-258 1980

21 Longevity, Body Weight, and Neoplasia in Ad Libitum-Fed and Diet-Restricted C57BL/6J Mice Fed NIH-31 Open Formula Diet Toxicologic Pathology 23(5): 570-582 1995

22 Dietary Protein, Life-Span and Biochemical Variables in Female Mice Journal of Gerontology 31(2): 144-148 1976

23 Mitotic Activity in Mice is Suppressed by Energy Restriction-Induced Torpor Journal of Nutrition 122: 1446-1453 1992

24 Aluminum in the Organs and Diet of Ageing C57BL/6J Mice Mechanisms of Ageing and Development 45: 145-156 1988

25 Brain Damage, Stress and Life Span: An Experimental Study Journal of Gerontology 37(2): 161-168 1982

Cryonics or Mere Freezing?

By Yvan Bozzonetti

The objective of cryonics is to keep corpses at low temperature for a possible revival at a later time, may be one or two centuries from now. The most common opinion in the medical profession may be summarized by "cryonics doesn't work". This is based on long studies in many fields, recognized diplomas and total ignorance of cryonics. That is not to say the cryonics road is without its problems. The worst seems to me the lag time between death and cooling. Outside ideal cases, there are many hours at high temperature, cells general structures may survive but not terminal connections at dendrite tips in neurons.

That may give a brain good for perfusion, with few cracks and a good microscopic appearance. Nevertheless, such a brain would be completely blank with no memory or personality if brought back to life. There are many efforts underway to upgrade cryonics procedures, they may succeed and all ow fully reversible cryonics. This would be very interesting in the medical domain: terminally ill patients could be "put on ice" until we can solve their problem. For "ordinary death" on the other hand there would be no substantial progress. The real problem is not a good conservation (even if it is important) but a full conservation of the biological information in the brain.

Some will argue that nanotechnology will build back all molecular structures and yes, they may be right. The question is when? If you walk in the country, you may see a chain of hills near the horizon. All of them it seems at the same distance. After some kilometres, you get at the foot of the first hill and you don't, anymore, see the others. When you get at the summit of the first hill, you see anew the others but they seem as far away as the first time. Cryonics looks somewhat as that journey. We are today at the first step and many solutions seems possible to get back to life whatever the initial conditions of conservation. When we have reversible cryonics, it may be so demanding on the freezing phase that "ordinary patients" may look as hopelessly scrambled at the molecular level. The medical profession will tell then: Yes, cryonics works, but only in the hospital, on well chosen cases, and so on... Ordinary cryonics is a mere pipe dream. You may as well discard your patient, we have always said that, and so on...

The greatest hazard would to be so involved at this time in the medical domain that this opinion would prevail. This is the down the first hill of the cryonics journey. The solution is to not let the medical profession get their hands on cryonics organizations. Cryonics must have its own technical specialists and must not be run by accountants resting on exterior "specialist" opinions to take decisions.

In the up-hill phase, scanning methods will be able to produce a real picture of the memory damage. This may be done with a resolving power of 0.1 micron or 1000 atoms. To contemplate even the possibility of a nano repair process would ask for an atomic scale analysis of the damage. This is a factor 1000 in the improvement of the scanning system and a factor 10^9 on the quantity of information handled. This objective is as far at that level as current magnetic resonance imaging is from reading a brain content at 0.1 micron. There may be discouragement, the many hills seem always as far from us that they where at start.

To bridge the gap, we must have some results with crude cryonics. A solution would be uploading. Running a brain class complex system may be possible for a PC-like computer half a century from now. That electronic brain could be linked to a new biological brain. The information recovery in a brain may be done at near 0.1 micron resolution, something well in the technological capabilities of the next fifty years. There is only one problem: We must not let the time between death and cooling to expand beyond some minutes. That precludes anything but straight freezing in most cases. Freeze damages will be huge and full blown nanotech will be required to repair them. On the other hand, the nondestructive brain reading of uploading could take place at a far earlier period.

What will we need for that option? I think the main item would be a small cooler able to produce carbonic snow or dry ice. That would give time to do paperwork and transportation at a cryonics facility. Edmund Scientific Co. sells such items, it could be a good idea for would be cryonics time traveller to buy one of them.

I live in France where law forbids nearly anything looking as cryonics, at least in principle. Long delays are inescapable before reaching a cryonics organization so, dry ice freezers are the only practical option here. I think the situation is no better in many countries such Germany or parts of Canada.

Hot Cryonics

by Douglas Skrecky

In Message #8417 Yvn Bozzonetti <yvanb@compuserve.com> wrote on the Internet:

That technology could be termed "hot" cryonics. In a first place we would look at temperature near -130 deg. C, the next step would be to look at dry ice temperature and so on until we have near room temperature conservation.

Many cryoprotectants are stable at dry ice temperatures. These are "solid" cryoprotectants that do not melt at room temperature when dry. An example of one of these is sorbitol which melts at 110 C. However even completely dry sorbitol is not inert at room temperature. This only occurs when it hardens to a glass at what is called the glass transition temperature or "Tg". For sorbitol this is -9 C. As for stability of frozen tissue this occurs at the annealed glass transition temperature or Tg'. For sorbitol this is -64 C, so sorbitol treated frozen tissue can be expected to be inert at dry ice temperatures. However there is a price to be paid for this tremendous increase in stability & safety relative to "liquid" cryoprotectants like glycerol & DMSO, with Tg's below -100 C. As far as I am aware all potential cryoprotectants that could be used in conjunction with dry ice storage suffer from relatively slow permeation into tissue. So preparation of tissue with sorbitol and other "solid" cryoprotectants would be time consuming relative to current procedures, which use glycerol. One cryoprotectant that shows promise here is adonitol, which permeates cell membranes over 30 times as quickly as sorbitol yet still melts at a warm and toasty 102 C. For those concerned about safety or expense of cryonic storage, adonitol might be close to being the optimal choice of cryoprotectant for use in conjunction with dry ice storage.

References:

Melting and Glass Transitions of Low Molecular Weight Carbohydrates Carbohydrate Research 238: 39-48 1993

Permeability Coefficients of Bull Speratozoa for water and polyhydric Alcohols Experimental Cell Research 69: 212-216 1971

Antibiotics and the Fruit Fly Experiments

by Yvan Bozzonetti

The Douglas Skrecky experiment with fruit fly bottles has produced an unexpected result: No supplement seems able to extend the life of the insects. On the other hand, bacterial contamination is a big problem and remains the single largest factor reducing life expectancy.

It is common in science to do an experiment to prove an idea and get back a result fully unexpected, that is the law of real world. That outcome must not be taken as a badly designed experiment. It is very significant and we must take the lesson from it. Well we have antibiotics and we may think of bacterial problems as a thing of the past. But really is it the case? I think not: Heart diseases remain a major problem and we know now most of them are linked to a bacterial infection of the blood system. In fact, our use of antibiotics solve only the largest crisis on young people. Elders have often chronic bacterial infection, a major determinant of life expectancy reduction as the fruit fly experiment demonstrates. So can we use more antibiotics? It would certainly be wise to use more for ourselves and less for poultry or pigs. We could try to harden our immune system with some "natural antibiotics" such as Rudbeckias, but there are two real problems and a false one.

I start with the false one: Continuous use of antibiotics produce resistant strains of bacteria. In fact, we know there are no more resistant strains today than at the dawn of the antibiotics era. This is because bacteria and fungus (the source of antibiotics) are at war for billions of years. The action of man is too feeble, too young, to have produced any large effect in that domain outside hospital. To get rid of that question anyway, we need only to mix two or three antibiotics with different modes of action.

A bacterium can get a mutation, not three at the same time. The first real problem comes from fungus and more particularly from the yeast candida albicans, a parasitic species found in the digestive tract of nearly everybody. Candidas can produce their own illness, but they are overlooked most of the time in chronic cases. Their cells are very similar to our own and it is very difficult to find a product able to wipe out candida without killing the components of our own body. Most of the time we use amphotericin, a special class of very toxic antibiotics. This is a solution for large infections, not the common background one. Unfortunately, even background candida contamination may be hazardous. Candidas turn sugars into acetaldehyde (AH for short), a simple molecule who reads: CH₃CHO. AH is produced as a by product of alcohol, cigarette smoke, breathing car exhaust and candida albicans activity. AH gets its way to the blood stream where it stiffen red blood cells, destroys vitamins B1, B3, B5, B6, C, N-Acetyl-Cysteine, zinc, Gamma Linolenic Acid (GLA) and Lipoic Acid. Hardened red blood cells can't find their way into capillary vessels and reduce the oxygen distributed to cells. This is particularly bad for the brain which displays an Alzheimer-like syndrome in extreme cases. Most often we see apathy, confusion, irritability, depression, fatigue, insomnia, head-aches...Most often these symptoms are not linked to candida contamination and are put on the stress of modern life or old age. In fact, they come from the B1 vitamin deficiency generated by AH produced by candida albicans. GLA deficiency is known to produce cardiac rhythm disorder opening the way to heart failure. Zinc loss puts you at the mercy of any virus, from common cold to flu to ...

Our problem then stands as this: If we do nothing, we will be killed by bacteria, if we do something against bacteria, we will end with very hazardous candida problems, the space left by the bacteria being taken by yeast. We are not alone to encounter problems with parasitic fungus, most plants are in the same case for far more times than us. Fig trees come from swampy tropical regions where moulds, fungus and yeast thrive. In the millions of years, they have learned to produce anti-fungus weapons, so that figs may be a good way to keep candida at bay. We must too reduce our consumption of sugar in free or complex forms such starch found in bred. Beware: Sugar is addictive! candida albicans turn it into AH and AH generates opioids in the brain. If you like too much sugar, you are intoxicated by candida! Interested reader can found more information on AH effects in the July issue of Nutritional News published by VRP, 3579 Hwy, 50 East, Carson City, NV 89701.

The last problem with antibiotics is the effect on mitochondria, the energy factory of cells. Mitochondria come from very old parasitic bacteria and so, may be destroyed by a drug designed to clear away bacteria. New protein-derived antibiotics from shark skin could be a solution. These big molecules can't enter the cell and so don't touch mitochondria. Being proteins, we can't swallow them, they would be destroyed in the stomach. A solution is to use a nasal or lung spray.

What we can do now? First, when there are problems of unknown origin, think about candida. Don't think all bacterial infections are a thing of the past. Don't wait until you can use immune system booster or antibiotics. Don't think you are the only man (or woman) on Earth without candida albicans. Reduce sugar, alcohol, starch, eat figs. This autumn, I am starting to plant 500 fig trees. Every new knowledge must be followed by practical action.

What Does the Future Hold

for Revived People?

The Editorial For September-October TFTN by Roger L. Bagula <tftn@earthlink.net>

Here in a sunny earthquake prone California the trend seems to be to make be poor, homeless or old a crime... John de Rivaz seems to think I am against cryonics for a means of burial: that is not the case. I believe that those who are the successes of the human gene pool should be reserved, revived if possible or cloned for the future if not. We need all the brain and other human potential, like courage, that we can get for the future. What I question is "methods" and "means" and "ends".

In the making of steel from liquid it is by rapid quenching that the smallest microcrystalline alloys are obtained: In my work with human and rat tissue I have found that rapid cooling to near dry ice temperatures and sustained temperatures at that higher level are all that is necessary to keep tissue good for very long periods if the surface is "scaled" from evaporation reflux. Freeze drying occurs at ordinary deep freeze temperatures. The Mammoth carcasses found in Siberia and Alaska that have been frozen for nearly ten thousand years had very good meat. The bronze age man found in the Swiss/Italian Mps frozen in glacial ice for thousands of years had still very good tissue. Corpses found in peat begs in Great Britain where little air or decomposition had taken place have given scientists very good tissue samples. I see no reason why we can not, with effort and for thought, preserve our tissues for future generations. Imagine a Mozart or a Riemann sitting next to you at a screening of Star Wars. At least three Hollywood movies have exploited cryonics ideas.

The question of how such technology might affect the long term evolution of humanity does enter the picture. We have enough idea of what the Cro-Magnon man of the end of the last ice age was like to know he was on the average bigger, stronger and probably smarter than the men of today. Civilization has "softened" men and kept alive those who would have died in the hardship of the ice age hunter. Do we have a moral responsibility not to ship our genetic defectives down the years to a future generation?

Genetic science is today advanced enough those brothers and sisters could have children if proper watch was made of the embryo as it is in those babies at risk in older women. The sampling of tissue at a very early age allows abortion of defectives before any real brain has formed in the baby. I know the Catholic fringe element will now see me as a target for their hate. The taboo of near relation marriages is due to pairing of recessive lethal and disabling genes that have built up in the population over many thousands of years. The interbreeding of tribal societies in hard environments like the ice age "weeded" out such defects. Even the most healthy and intelligent in our gene pool often harbors these recessive gene "time-bombs". In our western culture in all its richness, large families have become rarer and rarer. In my Dad's family of four sons and three daughters none resembled any of the others: this is one of the virtues of the USA's great genetic mixing of gene pools that were kept so separate by class and geography in Europe. Any way you look at my family's genetic heritage, it is a wild mix by the old European standards. In frontier American families in the west we don't even stand out as in any way uncommon. As a group we have no idea of the possible recessives this gene pool is building up. As a group my family has stayed alive more in spite of the powers that be than because they liked us.

Should we freeze ourselves, we have no way to say that the political forces of the future will be any friendlier than the past or present. Our bodies would be thawed and thrown on a dung heap by such as rule today. The current county officers are treating the poor and homeless shamelessly. And old people have to mostly look out for themselves if their families don t help. Here graveyards are" redeveloped" and their stones thrown away. The laws of the Constitution on keep in carrying arms, religion, ex post facto laws and search and seizure are all turned back as though the Bill of Rights never happened. What legal future can be said for a frozen body (declared dead)? Remember that Einstein's brain was donated to science and was found in a dessert store's pop cooler. His DNA as a clue to a successful human being would still be valuable today to real scientists.

We have to write some new and binding laws to deal with the futures of our remains if we chose to freeze ourselves. In Antigone by Sophocles the responsibility of the living to treat the dead with respect is thematic material. I know that John de Rivaz hates lawyers and I don't like the idea of putting my future in the hands of unborn lawyers either. It is only the rule of law that has kept the forces of hate in check that would desecrate all that is sacred and our icy tombs, should we be frozen. The tomb of an Egyptian king that has not been robbed is so rare as to be unknown: we have to look at the past if we are to have any idea of the future. Has anyone arrested the scientist that threw out Einstein's brain? It is not a crime? Only morally criminal in our day. The DNA of the dead will allow clones to be made of them in the near future of technology. We cannot allow Michael Jordan clones to be used to plaster ceilings without ladders, or clones of Richard Feynman to be use as bongo players.

In this essay I have talked about technological, genetic and legal issues of near-perfect preservation of human tissue after death. Moral and psychological issues were also touched on. Many people don't realize how close we are to the Jurassic Park type of technology. Having worked with medical doctors who harvested an organ from lobsters for their hormones, only so they could afford a good meal at the expense of their grants, I realize that morality is not a medical biggy. Laws to protect the dead will have to take away licenses to practice and put them in prison for at least five years to be of any effect at all when the gains can be so large. One advantage of ashes is they can't manufacture cloned androids from your tissue. Picture the future corporation who buys the rights to the patented DNA of the perfect factory worker and feeds and houses them like an Oklahoma chicken farm or a Kansas pig farm. And when they die, they are ground round and fed back to the other workers. Since they are of the dead and buried, they have no legal human rights in being manufactured. You say this is the far future? -Sheep have been cloned and other warm blooded mammals can be produced by the very same kind of process. The monkeys and other primates have been slaughtered in our labs in the name of science. Why not clones of people for organ transplants and drug tests? Better yet: defrost and revive these dead bodies that have no legal rights and use them as experimental subjects? We have no idea of all possible immoral futures that our decedents may be able to think of to make money off our dead flesh. Will we be over frozen food for future generations, as the Mammoth's were to Siberians?

R. L BAGULA 31 JULY 1997

This is an editorial of The Fractal Translight Newsletter $20/yr ($50 overseas) from R.L. Bagula 11759, Waterhill Road Lakeside CA 92949 USA. It is reprinted with the author's permission.

Editorial Comments.

One of the major problems with cryonics is the fact that whereas most people have heard of it, few have studied it in any detail and many misconceptions abound. In this essay we see several, the main ones being as follows.

1 Cryonics is not an advanced means of burial.

Although cryonics is an alternative to burial or cremation, it is not a process of disposal as these two are. Although legally it is regarded as such, in reality it is best regarded as a form of ambulance taking very sick people to where they can be cured. In fact it is a time ambulance taking sick people to when they can be cured. In a road or air ambulance there is a small risk of the journey adding to the patient's injuries or of the vehicle crashing and killing the occupants before it gets to the place of a cure. People do not decline ambulance rides on this consideration. In the case of cryonics the ride is very damaging and the risk of failure far greater. (Although the patient is unconscious and totally unaware of the journey.) But as annihilation is the only alternative, some people do choose to take these risks. A risk is not a problem if the alternative is nothing at all. A risk is only a problem if a choice has to be made between two risky courses.

2 The chances of future civilisation reviving people for bad purposes are low for logical reasons.

Mr Bagula seems to suggest that suspension and revival is simple, quoting mammoths and peat bog remains etc. Whereas it is relatively simple to preserve form, or create identical clones, the preservation of microscopic structure so as to preserve the program and data in the b rain ("soul") is much more difficult, and professional cryonicists are aware that what they are doing may not work at all. But they know it is better than nothing, which is the only alternative Even if the brain program and data are preserved, its recovery is a herculean task, which is why so many establishment experts say it will be impossible. Cryonicists suggest that nanotechnology is the most likely means by which this can be achieved.

Nanotechnology involves the use of individual atoms and molecules as the working parts of machines that can compute and manipulate other atoms and molecules. This technology could build, atom by atom, any physical structure. Using nano assemblers working in parallel, structures could be grown at a reasonable speed. We know this is possible, because this is how plants and animals are made in the natural environment.

A civilisation with access to the awesome power of nanotechnology would find it totally unnecessary to use it to revive people for nefarious purposes. It would be easier to make a new person than to revive an old one, for any purpose. Humanity has an excellent record by and large for caring for the sick, and reviving cryonics patients would be an extension of this record.

Why do you keep making more people when you do not look after those you have already got?

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