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Suspended Animation In Mice Without Freezing
Predictions Market writes "Low doses of hydrogen sulfide, the toxic gas responsible for the unpleasant odor of rotten eggs, can safely and reversibly depress both metabolism and aspects of cardiovascular function in mice, producing a suspended-animation-like state that does not depend on a reduction in body temperature and include a substantial decrease in heart rate without a drop in blood pressure. The researchers measured factors such as heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature, respiration, and physical activity in normal mice exposed to low-dose (80 ppm) hydrogen sulfide for several hours. In all the mice, metabolic measurements such as consumption of oxygen and production of carbon dioxide dropped in as little as 10 minutes after they began inhaling hydrogen sulfide, remained low as long as the gas was administered, and returned to normal within 30 minutes of the resumption of a normal air supply. 'Producing a reversible hypometabolic state could allow organ function to be preserved when oxygen supply is limited, such as after a traumatic injury,' says the lead author of the study. 'We don't know yet if these results will be transferable to humans, so our next step will be to study the use of hydrogen sulfide in larger mammals.' The full report is available online."
after inhaling hydrogen sulfide for 30 minutes, trust me, you'll wish you were dead.
We can clone mice. We can cure mice cancer. We can put them into suspended animation, allowing them to live on into future generations (meaning they will probably be the first organic space pets). Something tells me that the rats of NIMH are already in the execution phase of some higher level plans with all the work we've managed to accomplish on their genetics.
Premature pressure loss can result in a whole room full of people in suspended animation.
.. :-)
"All I can remember was this overpowering stink"
Insert
How we know is more important than what we know.
many things that can save our lives (major surgery, chemotherapy) also leaves us wanting to die. Just because something is horribly painful doesn't mean we should avoid it.
While that's insightful in its own right, from reading the summary, I get the impression that they're not aiming for the kind of suspended animation where you freeze someone for 1000 years and wake them up later. Doing that at room temperature would be kinda dangerous anyway, since if you slowed their immune system 10 times they'll rot alive sooner or later anyway.
I'm getting the impression that this is more for rushing you to a hospital when they picked you up half-dead and bled half-dry off the side of the road.
If you're in serious shock for example, if the other mechanisms still work, the body will try to keep the brain alive, even at the cost of cutting off oxygen supply to the other internal organs. Which decay very fast. (Muscles have their own oxygen reserves, so they tend to survive, your liver doesn't.) Cells run out of oxygen and essentially commit suicide in an orderly fashion, i.e., apoptosis.
If it doesn't have enough even for the brain, which is often the case, the damage is irreversible and often fatal. Very fast.
So if they can slow your metabolism a lot, that might just give them extra time to haul you into ER. It might just turn that 5 minute rush before your brain starts getting massive damage, into, say, 50 minutes. Which might just do the trick.
I.e., briefly: it's not for colonizing Alpha Centauri, mate, it's just while they haul you to ER.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Thats great, now all we need is a heuristic computer with a suitable monitoring alogrithm to look after them whilst they are sleeping/hibernating. Still, good luck looking for volunteers for those trials.
Induced hibernation
In 2005 it was shown that mice can be put into a state of suspended animation-like hypothermia by applying a low dosage of hydrogen sulfide (80 ppm H2S) in the air. The breathing rate of the animals sank from 120 to 10 breaths per minute and their temperature fell from 37 C to just 2 C above ambient temperature (in effect, they had become cold-blooded). The mice survived this procedure for 6 hours and afterwards showed no negative health consequences.[6] In 2006 it was shown that the blood pressure of mice treated in this fashion with hydrogen sulfide did not significantly decrease.[7]
Such a hibernation occurs naturally in many mammals and also in toads, but not in mice. (Mice can fall into a state called clinical torpor when food shortage occurs). If the H2S-induced hibernation can be made to work in humans, it could be useful in the emergency management of severely injured patients, and in the conservation of donated organs.
As mentioned above, hydrogen sulfide binds to cytochrome oxidase and thereby prevents oxygen from binding, which leads to the dramatic slowdown of metabolism. Animals and humans naturally produce some hydrogen sulfide in their body; researchers have proposed that the gas is used to regulate metabolic activity and body temperature, which would explain the above findings.[8]
However, a 2008 study failed to reproduce the effect in pigs, concluding that the effects seen in mice were not present in larger mammals. [9]
Just -1, Troll talking to another.
If you have a suspended mouse, just check the ball hasn't got fluff on it.
For wireless mice, check the battery level and ensure its paired correctly with its base station.
liqbase
You can also enable long term space travels with such a finding!
Maybe Computers will never be as intelligent as Humans.
For sure they won't ever become so stupid. [VR-1988]
They can suspend a mice, but making Ubuntu suspend on my laptop and work afterwards; that they can't do. It's a strange world
...I am doing something good to people when I fart in a room ?
prrrrtttttttttttttttt......
"Ok, who left the fart ?"
"It was me ! I wanted to prolong your lives !"
"That's a kind of frank boldness I haven't seen before...."
Slashdot: stuff for news, nerds that matter, matter for news, stuff that nerd
... the tests Josef Mengele was conducting during WWII and Alabama's hall-of-famer J. Marion Sims in the 19th century?
I'm no bleeding-heart animal-rights activist, but these kinds of stories always make me nauseous.
If I put my "Tom And Gerry" DVD on pause, I too can create "suspended animation" of a mouse without freezing a mouse.
Take Nobody's Word For It.
A tragic youth, wasted, attempting to put Mc Donalds restaurants into suspended animation..
I record my sleeptalking
that's why we pause for a second when someone tells us they farted ... i thought it was to grade the fart like eddy murphy thought us.
Wow, this is really new and interesting stuff. I can't quite put my finger on it, but reading it gives me the strangest sense of deja vu.
I read recently (on /. I think) that it was discovered the tissue damage was done when RISING o2 levels triggered apoptosis. Meaning there is actually a period as long as 2hrs where little or no tissue damage has occurred. If the o2 levels can be brought up in a way that keeps the trigger from thinking a massive o2 spike is about to mutate all the DNA we might realize the dream of Herbert West. I also read about this a while back and they didn't think it would scale to humans, but if it did, it might stack nicely to allow delaying reanimation even longer.
refactor the law, its bloated, confusing and unmaintainable.
I don't like Linux. This doesn't make me a troll.
I can see it now. An elevator in a high rise office building reaches the main floor. When the door opens, a car full of unconscious people is revealed. Subsequent investigation proves that the exhaust fan failed two floors below a stop on Floor 99, where the offices of the Beerf, Art & Ghasper Pickled Egg & Sausage Supply, Ltd. are located.
I think the old saying was, "It's an ill wind that blows nobody good".
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Seriously. H2S is not something harmless, you should be careful when playing with it.
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
... some towns around the planet have quite a reputation for having a high sulphur rate in their atmosphere (Rotorua in NZ is nicknamed "Sulphur City" because of that -- you can actually smell it when you're getting close to the town, and it takes a little while to get used to breathing that air !). Why don't they conduct a survey on the metabolism of the people naturally exposed to those gases ?
In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
2005.
See Wikipedia "Hydrogen Sulfide".
"Absorbing your worst..."
Enough of this fake "science" funded by corporations like Taco Bell.
Yes, because that dream, as I recall, was one of the more pleasant dreams we could realize...
At the Lutheran church I attended as a child, the well water came up through a sulferous layer of rock. Every time the water ran, the place reeked of rotten eggs. Maybe it wasn't the sermons that put us to sleep all those years...
I use irony whenever I can, but my shirts are still wrinkled...
GODWIIIIIIINN !
There, you have it. Oh, and BTW :
Since we're talking about sulphur gases, it's "the end justifies the beans".In Soviet Russia, our new overlords are belong to all your base.
This whole suspended animation thing would be wholly unnecessary if they had just supplied the cruise liner with the full complement of lemon-soaked paper napkins from the beginning.
I am officially gone from
Yes, and iron is a big factor in this process apparently. When oxygen-filled blood finally reaches the damaged tissues, the liberated iron acts as a super free-radical and wreaks havoc.
I think the article you're referring to is http://www.newsweek.com/id/35045
What else smells like rotting eggs? So for these mice, this leads to the unfortunate question "who cut the cheese"? ... I'm here all week....
Yeah. The Science Fair kids will have a heyday with this one.
"Measuring Effectiveness of Organically Generated H2S in the Suspended Animation of Mice"
"Astronaut Self-Suspension Device for Use in a Sealed Suit Environment"
"Beans and Beer: To the Moon, Alice!"
1. hydrogen sulfide = a TOXIC gas.
2. Mice are INHALING hydrogen sulfide.
So, they are inhaling a toxic gas? How can this be good for them?
I heard that arsenic is a good preservative too.
*sheesh*
This could be mouse-specific. After all, they are tunneling rodents and tunnels are sometimes temporarily gas-filled.
It could be just an adaptation: "Oh-Oh! Bad air! Let's shut down and wait it out."
Just curious how this keeps brain tissues alive? Without a constant supply of fresh oxygen the brain tissues begin to die in 5 minutes (give or take). If the hydrogen sulfide slows the heart rate that much, wouldn't those tissues suffocate, causing sever brain damage?
"Low doses of hydrogen sulfide, the toxic gas responsible for the unpleasant odor of rotten eggs"
Hey Dude, smell my fart for like 20 or 30 years man!"
Thank you for advancing hyperlinks to the next stage. I hope that someday all links shall simply be referred to as 'Goatse', and that 'Goatse' shall lead everywhere. One day, the Internet will be nothing but a large, gaping asshole.
Thank you.
It's bad enough passing the oil refinery on the 101 north of Ventura, that has it's eternal 30 foot flame of burning Hydrogen sulfide. The stench is nauseating along one of the most visually beautiful stretches of highway on earth as is hugs along side the pacific.
Now your telling me that we are going to have to smell this nasty stuff all the way to mars and beyond?
Talk about ruining the trip of a lifetime.
I'd rather take my chances with being frozen.
I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso
Are allways N+20 years out where N is todays date (updated every day)
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.
You can't take the sky from me...
Last time around, I had this to say about it. Hellloooo! 2006 just called, it wants its +5 Informative back.
Breakfast served all day!
.....One day, the Internet will be nothing but a large, gaping asshole.Thank you. Hi, you must be new here.
A good quarter of British households, or more, invest more in a canine or feline than the proverbial starving African, so they've made the same judgment Hitler made. That's because I can't get a starving african to lick my hand or nuzzle my crotch anywhere near as much as my canine does... nevertheless, those starving africans are welcome to anything my little poochie doesn't eat... which isn't much, considering that she eats her own feces.
Here's a neat way to do Suspended Animation In Mice as a DIY hardhack project.
I believe this has even been covered on Slashdot before.
Oh, and this is from 2002.
Ah, arrogance and stupidity, all in the same package. How efficient of you. -- Londo Mollari
maybe they can use this on the rats that got into the high-speed at Comcast. (If you ever seen that commercial.)
Imagine the weaponization or equivalent use of this gas to bring ground wars to a state of...
suspension... and the characters probably WILL become... animated... But, I fear the doses required to suspend the animated warriors may be strong enough to ruin seals on masks, and possibly just burn up the lungs.
Gives new meaning to "compulsory expulsion"...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
this one...
Of Mice and Men...
the gas is thin...
let too much in
Call your next of kin
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
lications...
i was going to ask "Are there any "StraTactical" uses/applications of this?"
But, then i think i probably have to answer my own question with:
1. deep-sea sleds-delivered divers or swimmers might get gas and the bends on delivery
2. what would be the weight tradeoff in sleds vs rebreathing units?
3. what kind of missions might need divers to be suspended?
4. would this enable submarine crews trapped at say 3,000 feet to hibernate until rescued?
5. could this be weaponized and used to attack ships even if they have air filter systems?
For civilian uses:
1. could this put risky prison populations in a new form of "lockdown" or isolation?
2. what good might there be in combining this with flash-bang devices?
3. would this be useful for crowd control, where the public is conditioned to fear this gas
4. would this have any "Black Sunday" (think the movie) application in a sports dome?
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Well, considering "stretch some muscles", they'll have to take some newly codified law books with them, redefining sexual misdemeanors.
"The more I miss it, de meaner i get" is what some might say. I guess it might separate the men from the mice, the asTROnaughts from assholenauts and the a*holenaughts...
Now, if necrosis or other tissue damage happens to the reproductive organs (why would they be different? Well, has anyone studied the effects of N2S on sperm count? Ovarian production?), colonization of distant worlds might just remain a twinkle in the human eye.
I suppose this question (probably asked by others) might lead to funding of N2S+SEX studies for astronauts.
BTW, the originally-first-slated Korean astronaut was dismissed for two security violations. I'd read in Shanghai Daily News (March 20 issue) about it.
--
http://bigblog.com/space_science/1st-korean-astronaut-could-be-a-woman-1329645657.html
"Korea's first astronaut hopes to make peace with North"
----
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2008/03/123_20464.html
"``The main reason for the cut is Ko made two consecutive security violations,'' said Lee Sang-mok, the head of the ministry's space technology bureau, adding that both events appeared unintentional."
---
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/opinon/2008/03/202_20538.html
"The switch came after the Russian side dismissed South Korea's original choice, Ko San, for repeatedly breaking training protocol."
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
I'll bet they wonder "Hey, where's my flying car?!"
"I improvise. It's my greatest talent. I prefer situations to plans..." --Wintermute, William Gibson's "Neuromancer"
the problem is that the freezing creates ice, sharp ice...
Very good point. This is why cryonic suspension efforts typically involve displacing as much water as possible with a cryoprotective (usually glycerol-based) solution before reaching the freezing point. This minimizes ice crystal formation, which is very much a Good Thing.
The current state-of-the-art in cryonic suspension involves using a vitrifying solution that never actually freezes at all, but instead becomes glass-like. There are still technical challenges that are being overcome, but Alcor has been using vitrification in at least some of their patients since 2000. Electron micrographs of vitrified tissues show that in cases with good perfusion cellular structures survive the process with little or no damage.
Boundless Expansion, Self-Transformation, Dynamic Optimism, Intelligent Technology, Spontaneous Order- BEST DO IT SO!