New Antifreeze Molecule Isolated In Alaskan Beetle

Arvisp writes with the news of a recently discovered antifreeze molecule in an Alaskan beetle that departs from most commonly identified natural antifreeze. "'The most exciting part of this discovery is that this molecule is a whole new kind of antifreeze that may work in a different location of the cell and in a different way,' said zoophysiologist Brian Barnes, director of the University of Alaska Fairbanks Institute of Arctic Biology and one of five scientists who participated in the Alaska Upis ceramboides beetle project. Just as ice crystals form over ice cream left too long in a freezer, ice crystals in an insect or other organism can draw so much water out of the organism's cells that those cells die. Antifreeze molecules function to keep small ice crystals small or to prevent ice crystals from forming at all. They may help freeze-tolerant organisms survive by preventing freezing from penetrating into cells, a lethal condition. Other insects use these molecules to resist freezing by supercooling when they lower their body temperature below the freezing point without becoming solid."

Comments

Cryogenics?

[girlintraining]

Could this discovery be developed to make cryogenically preserving people work? As it is right now, the cells rupture during the freezing process -- if the cells remained intact, reviving them would become possible.

Re:Cryogenics?

[idontgno]

if the cells remained intact, reviving them would become possible.

Well, no more impossible than reviving them shortly after death, without the complications and damage (subtle or extreme) caused by freezing, or decapitating and freezing, or post-mortem whatnot.

I think the greater obstacle is the entire "reviving them after they're dead" bit.

Re:Cryogenics?

[7Ghent]

Cryonics does not freeze tissue. The current method involves vitrification, not freezing. Vitrification is an ice-free process in which more than 60% of the water inside cells is replaced with protective chemicals. This completely prevents freezing during deep cooling. Instead of freezing, molecules just move slower and slower until all chemistry stops at the glass transition temperature (approximately -124C). Unlike freezing, there is no ice formation or ice damage in vitrified tissue. Blood vessels have been reversibly vitrified, and whole kidneys have been recovered and successfully transplanted after cooling to -45C while protected with vitrification chemicals.

Re:Cryogenics?

[greyhueofdoubt]

This opens up a really gray area in terms of medical ethics. Here:

There are many documented cases of people being revived after prolonged (over one hour) 'death' caused by exposure to cold with few side-effects. However, and this is a BIG however- those people were "killed" by the cold; that is, they did not fall victim to leukemia and suddenly die, falling into icy water.

So...

The obvious(?) answer is to freeze people who are *near* death. Well, that's kind of murder/euthanasia according to the laws on the books. Without that particular issue, yeah, this would work great. But we'd have to come to accept this as preservation instead of euthanasia. We could work it until the chances of coming out of it alive were the same as surviving open-heart surgery or something comparable, but I think there would still be that mental/emotional block. Not to mention that critically-ill/hospice patients are already fragile. "Gramp is still alive but we're going to freeze him," still has a funeral feel. The person is, in effect, dying until revived when whatever criteria were met. If we don't cure cancer (for example) in our lifetime, then that *is* a funeral for the patient's family and friends.

-b

YES!

[Mr.Fork]

Now they can develop a candy for kids in the wintertime so they can stop sticking their tongues to metal posts!

Re:wait...

[Firehed]

For the record, i can't RTFA from where i'm posting.

Well of course not. This is Slashdot, after all.

Re:wait...

[wizardforce]

Unfortunately the summery took this bit drectly from TFA and it is as you'd suspect, technically incorrect. Ice breaks open the cells (lysing them) which causes the cell contents to spill out of the cell into whatever medium they are in. This quite predictably, kills the cells. However, ice that forms extremely rapidly forms a glass-like phase of ice that does less harm to the cells. The interesting things about this new antifreeze molecule are that 1) it's not a protein; it's a fairly simple molecule and 2) it's lipophillic (tends to hang around fatty things like cell membranes) which makes it a very useful discovery in terms of biological antifreeze molecules.

New organic anti-freeze

[formfeed]

Beetlejuice!