Zombie Pigs First, Hibernating Soldiers Next

ColdWetDog writes "Wired is running a story on DARPA's effort to stave off battlefield casualties by turning injured soldiers into zombies by injecting them with a cocktail of one chemical or another (details to be announced). From the article, 'Dr. Fossum predicts that each soldier will carry a syringe into combat zones or remote areas, and medic teams will be equipped with several. A single injection will minimize metabolic needs, de-animating injured troops by shutting down brain and heart function. Once treatment can be carried out, they'll be "re-animated" and — hopefully — as good as new.' If it doesn't pan out we can at least get zombie bacon and spam."

Comments

Don't do it

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't they watch movies? Haven't we learned anything?

Re:Don't do it

[larpon]

He just left4bacon

Re:Don't do it

[Kral_Blbec]

If they had to use the needle in the first place then they are in a situation where they are already going to die. Its not important how many die as a result of using it, its about how many survive thanks to it.

its like the stimpaks back in StarCraft. Sure you might die after using it, but if you do its not because you used it, its because you got shot. However if you do use it then your chance of surviving, even though you were shot, increase.

Re:Don't do it

[Ihmhi]

Well, if I'm shot in the foot, I'm sure as hell not gonna take that injection.

If a bullet went through my lung and I know I'm well and truly fucked, I'll take the 10% death risk over the "let's see how long it takes medevac to get here" death risk.

Disclaimer: IANAS(oldier).

Brain damage?

[thesandtiger]

One of the biggies in this war is Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) - surviving explosions, surviving shots to the helmet - I wonder if we'll be swapping out a lot of dead soldiers for ones suffering extreme brain injury.

A friend of mine just came back from Germany. He lost both of his legs and has TBI caused mood swings like you wouldn't believe, and pretty much looks like it will wreck his family. Staving off death is one thing (and good); making life after injury worth living is another.

Re:Brain damage?

[Reason58]

One of the biggies in this war is Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) - surviving explosions, surviving shots to the helmet - I wonder if we'll be swapping out a lot of dead soldiers for ones suffering extreme brain injury.

A friend of mine just came back from Germany. He lost both of his legs and has TBI caused mood swings like you wouldn't believe, and pretty much looks like it will wreck his family. Staving off death is one thing (and good); making life after injury worth living is another.

You are absolutely right. Many of the soldiers who take this shot will have suffered TBI and will require brains. Braaaaiiiiiins.

Re:Brain damage?

[TubeSteak]

One of the biggies in this war is Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) - surviving explosions, surviving shots to the helmet - I wonder if we'll be swapping out a lot of dead soldiers for ones suffering extreme brain injury.

Cooling the brain has been known for years to work miracles on minimizing head trauma and taming neurological conditions.
There's no reason for soldiers who've received head injuries to not wear a cooling helmet for a few days after the trauma.

Someone even took the idea and integrated chemical icepacks into motorcycle helmets so that the brain immediately starts getting cooled upon impact.

Re:Brain damage?

[icegreentea]

Well, its not as clear cut as that. Current research (a google search away!) tells us that while its probable that inducing hypothermia in the the brain reduces neurological damage, we currently get somewhat contradicting studies suggesting otherwise. In the best case, it may turn out that cooling the brain is an extremely delicate task that must be carefully controlled. Given the level of precision apparently needed, it seems unlikely that simply plopping on a cooled helmet is the best way to go about reducing brain trauma.

In any case, reducing circulation increases the chance of infection (important if there was actual head trauma in addition to brain trauma), and appears to raise the risk of blood clots and heart attacks.

Doesn't mean its useless though. Just that like so many other medical ideas, its complicated. And just cause some company makes a product based on it, doesn't mean it works just like they say it does.

Re:Brain damage?

[TubeSteak]

In any case, reducing circulation increases the chance of infection (important if there was actual head trauma in addition to brain trauma), and appears to raise the risk of blood clots and heart attacks.

Since you haven't cited anything specific, all I can say is that my understanding (which may be wrong) is that those risks apply to full body hypothermia and not to localized cooling of the brain.

AFAIK, the best way to cool the head is with a circulating neck & head system + warming blankets to keep the body out of hypothermia, which minimizes the clotting and infection risk.

Re:Brain damage?

[icegreentea]

There's one review of 6 studies here. http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/204205255_1.html

If you look at the last page, you get this:

Implications for Practice Hypothermia shows promise as a treatment of traumatic brain injury. However, there are several important points to consider when contemplating its use. Hypothermia as a treatment of traumatic brain injury should be utilized in hospitals with specialized neuroscience units that have continuous resident coverage. In addition, nurses are at the front line of initiating the treatment and must be properly taught to care for these patients. There are many potential complications of hypothermia that nurses must be aware of and trained to aggressively treat. The nursing care involved in caring for a patient with a severe brain injury is complex, and it is crucial that they have the support and appropriate nursing ratios to care for these patients.

Granted, its from a nursing journal, so its going to promote the use of nurses. But it remains that just cooling people's brains nilly willy with ice packed helmets may not be the best idea.

Re:Brain damage?

[electrons_are_brave]

Ever since I studied neuropsychlogy and we had people with TBIs being brought in each week I have developed a similar viewpoint.

Medical technology gets to the point where it can save lives, but many of these lives end up not worth living.

Re:Brain damage?

[aukset]

In the field of EMS, we're (in NYS at least) by protocol asked to hyper-oxygenate patients with suspected brain injury in trauma patients that meet a certain set of criteria. The reason for this is to cause vasoconstriction within the brain, reducing blood flow due to vascular resistance and, in theory, slow internal bleeding. As far as I know, the literature on this is uncertain as to its efficacy, but the theory behind it is sound.

Brain tissue can survive for quite a while in a state of hypoxia, compared to other tissues. What is most dangerous in a hemorrhage in the brain is compression of the tissue, as well as direct exposure to blood, both of which can cause necrosis. In fact, when the brain "detects" an injury, its usual response is to increase blood pressure, which is going to accelerate any hemorrhage and make the problem worse. Decreasing heart rate and blood pressure would be an advantage until surgical services are available to drain the blood and close off the source of bleeding.

Oxidative damage.

[spineboy]

Most of these types of experiments have previously been in cryo-preservation - some scientist, in Boston I believe, has successfully frozen beagles, and brought them back to life.

Anyway, In trauma surgery, the "Golden Hour" refers to the window of time, where massively injured patients can be saved from horrible injuries. After that, too much damage occurs, and the chance is severely diminished.

So using H2S(hydrogen sulphide) should help stop oxidative reactions, extending the "Golden Hour", allowing the patient to be stabilized, and brought to a higher level of care, where they can be fixed up.

Small side effect - H2S is basically the stench in Marsh gas, so these soldiers are going to smell like stink ass zombies for a while I think.

Re:Oxidative damage.

[IdahoEv]

some scientist, in Boston I believe, has successfully frozen beagles, and brought them back to life.

[Citation needed]. Sorry, that's just too interesting a claim to go uncommented.

I believe that dogs have been cooled to near-freezing temperatures, cardiovascular function temporarily halted, and revived after a few hours. But their tissues remained unfrozen and their blood remained liquid the entire time.

Nobody, AFAIK, has successfully frozen and revived a mammal.

Damage Mechanism

[Renraku]

One of the main mechanisms for brain damage after injury to the brain is due to the neurons releasing their packets of neurotransmitters upon their death. So you have a good neuron right next to a big blob of toxic neurotransmitters. Then that neuron dies, too. It's a chemical cascade of dying neurons. Slowing down metabolism slows down this damage, as oxidation plays a large part. Ever see those people that drown in icy water, only to be revived after hours without oxygen, somewhat intact? Same thing.

Re:Damage Mechanism

[Zerimar]

Ever see those people that drown in icy water, only to be revived after hours without oxygen, somewhat intact?

No sir, I have never watched a person drown in icy water and then revived hours later. Is this a common thing to see?

Re:Damage Mechanism

[DynaSoar]

One of the main mechanisms for brain damage after injury to the brain is due to the neurons releasing their packets of neurotransmitters upon their death. So you have a good neuron right next to a big blob of toxic neurotransmitters. Then that neuron dies, too. It's a chemical cascade of dying neurons. Slowing down metabolism slows down this damage, as oxidation plays a large part. Ever see those people that drown in icy water, only to be revived after hours without oxygen, somewhat intact? Same thing.

You're referring to apoptosis, "cellular suicide" caused by a signal from a nearby neuron dying. Parkinson's is one disorder that wouldn't occur except for this phenomenon.

But forced release of vesicles, toxic neurotransmitters and hypothermic preservation (or lack of, or lack of equivalent)? I can tell you remember learning about it, and probably know what you mean, but you've got some details bent. The toxicities involved in apoptosis aren't metabolic processes, but they are slowed by cooling. Cooling can be done to reduce oxidative stress due to hyperoxia (too much oxygen) as well as ischemic insult from hypoxia (too little). We're just more aware of the latter due to the many reported cases of recovery from near drowning due to rapid cooling.

OMG

[thelonious]

They are going to end up with bacon that doesn't die! And that would be a sin against humanity!

Re:OMG

[illumastorm]

I, for one, welcome our delicious, self-propelling into mouths, bacon overlords.

I disagree

[carp3_noct3m]

My buddies and I have always postured what we would do if and when a zombie apocalypse broke out. All being military or former military, with the ability to bear arms and the survival skills (not to mention the remote getaway) already at our disposal, we all voted the human race as generally despicable and that it was about time there was some event to clean the slate. It's time to kick zombie ass and chew bubblegum, and I'm all outa gum.

Re:I disagree

[B1oodAnge1]

You fool!!! The last thing we need during the Zombie Apocalypse is armed bears!

Re:I disagree

[fractoid]

I'm a BEARLOCK now!

Re:I disagree

[Bl4d3]

Yes and with armed bears and zombie pigs ManBearPig can't be far away.

Fear ManBearPig, this is cereal business!

Opposite of a Zombie

[Labcoat Samurai]

The terminology seems odd here. Isn't suspended animation pretty much the opposite of being a zombie? I mean zombies are the animated dead. Suspended animation makes you the unanimated living.

Re:Opposite of a Zombie

[carp3_noct3m]

Stop bursting my bubble of zombie Apocalypse hope!

Re:Opposite of a Zombie

[Labcoat Samurai]

Use body heat from meatbags as a power source in case we accidentally block out the sun with pollution?

Wait, no, that's stupid. My mistake

Re:Opposite of a Zombie

[FlyingBishop]

Actually, this is almost exactly like the original African myths. A witch-doctor supposedly could feed someone a potion to put them into a false death, they would be buried and then dug up later, a slave to the witch doctor. There's probably even a thread of truth to the tales.

The modern zombie is a more recent innovation, dating more or less to Dawn of the Dead. The real difference between this zombie and the mythic one is that here the human hopefully wakes up fully possessed of their senses.

Re:Opposite of a Zombie

[ElizabethGreene]

Sit through just _one_ corporate meeting and you will quickly realize that for a given cluster of human brains,

IQ = 2/(brains ^(blackberries+iphones+1)) * average IQ.

-ellie

(Yes I realize that the parentheses around the denominator are redundant. They are for clarity.)

End up with bacon that doesn't die!

[Anonymous Coward]

That sounds like heaven on earth if you ask me.

In fact, I think this could be the basis for a new religion with a communion that doesn't let you down in the flavor department.

The Future Of Medicine

[Citizen of Earth]

Really, this is how I see medicine in the future. If you suffer serious trauma, the paramedics will simply kill you at the scene and take your corpse to a hospital where the doctors will patch you up and resurrect you several hours later. If your hand gets mangled, they will simply hack it off, slather on some stem cells, and you'll over a few months, you'll just grow a new one.

Re:The Future Of Medicine

[Xest]

"Really, this is how I see medicine in the future."

Yes, unfortunately it's also what I see as the cause of the 22nd century's major problem just as ours is climate change. Their problem will be massive overpopulation, how do you deal with a population that doesn't die but keeps increasing when the resources of the planet they live on can't sustain their population even right now, let alone then?

The only options are to either let people die, stop new people being born, or move to other planets. I'm not convinced in a hundred years we'll have the technology to get to other inhabitable planets and, well, inhabit them. If this is indeed the case it'll be a decision between preventing new births or enforcing maximum life spans to achieve the former options.

The ability to keep people alive indefinitely and recover people from even the most horrific incidents may well be the next atomic bomb- a technology that we may find that we would often perhaps like to be able to undiscover.

Does anyone else have any ideas how we might go about solving the population problem should we obtain the ability to keep people alive much longer and fight back death? A solution that can realistically be achieved in at most, the next 91 years.

Re:The Future Of Medicine

[Xest]

"Interestingly, all you need to limit the immortal population is to allow a maximum of two children per parents (or maximum one child per person)."

I agree it's a valid option certainly, but China has a different culture to us- here in the UK for example there would be uproar if you put a limit on child birth. What about accidental pregnancies beyond the limit- do you force an abortion because she already has 2 kids even if it's against the mother's will for example?

"That is in fact quite a long time. 91 years ago was the time of first cars, planes and electronics..."

It both is and isn't, you're right that we've done all that, but how much has the car changed? We're only just now slowly moving away from the combustion engine for example. Similarly we went to the moon 40 years ago, but we've really done very little by way of manned missions since.

You're right that a lot has changed, but a lot has stayed the same also.

"Also, thinking about it.... Does not "hibernation" technology also give you means to deal with growing population? Would not be bad if you get bored to hibernate until more interesting times. Putting to the extreme, you can hibernate large fraction of population until you develop technology to colonize the space :)"

It's true but I would presume you still need to consume resources to achieve hibernation- bodies would have to be kept likely in temperature controlled environments and looked after such that even a body in hibernation is consuming at least some resources.

well i knew it....

[jisou]

darpa is defiantly going to be the government organization to incite the zombie apocalypse. though i shouldn't say that to loud considering the made the internet.....

Long Duration Space Flight

[Usually Unlucky]

Couldn't this be tweaked and used as a method of hibernation to stave off boredom and conserve supplies for long duration space flight?

Re:Long Duration Space Flight

[ignavus]

Couldn't this be tweaked and used as a method of hibernation to stave off boredom...

...at work?

Re:Long Duration Space Flight

[mrsquid0]

I would like to see this technique tweaked and used as a method of hibernation to stave off boredome and conserve supplies when there is nothing good on tv.

and so it begins

[mongrol]

They'll only reanimate the parts that watch TV, rent movies (repeatedly in a variety of formats, buy mobile phones (repeatedly in a variety of formats) and leave of the rest of the dissident free thinking ganglion parts dormant.