A life in suspension. A new science that is heralded as the key to

immortality. Freezing bodies for return at a later date may seem like the

answer to eternal life, but is there a more sinister side to this controversial

practice, and can freezing your body after death really provide you

with eternal life ?

The theory behind cryonics is fairly straightforward. You die, you are

frozen, and then you are thawed out in a future world where vast technological

advances have taken place. Here they can cure anything. All your problems,

including mortality, are solved at a stroke. One, two hundred years after your

death, you get up and walk.

Cryobiology originated in the '50s, when bulls sperm was frozen for

artificial insemination. It first seized the public, however, when an

American physics teacher, Robert Ettinger, discussed the idea of human

preservation in this manner in his book The Prospect of Immortality. 

Three years later, Dr James Belford became the first person to be suspended

at the ultra low temperatures when he died of lung cancer. Since then, cryonics

companies have amassed hundreds of customers.

Once a body arrives at the cryonics lab, the freezing process begins. First

the blood is removed and replaced by a glycerol-based anti-freeze to minimise

tissue damage. This is ecause when blood freezes, it form tiny ice crystals

which tear holes in the cell walls causing haemorrhaging.

Then the body is quick-frozen at a rate of several degrees per second (slow

freezing also causes ice crystals to form) until the temperature is minus 196.

This temperature is crucial, it is the boling point of liquid nitrogen-the

chemical used to keep the body frozen. Liquid nitrogen is used because unlike

other drying or embalming techniques, it does not cause or allow decomposition

of the body.

There are two options in cryonics. You can opt for a "neuro", which means

that only the head and brain will be frozen. The other option is for a

full-body, although this involves being stored upside-down (tis way if a 

problem arises, only the feet will be damaged before the problem is rectified).

Those who opt for a neuro say that in the future it will be possible to use

the DNA in the brain tissue to clone a new body, so there is no need to keep

the old one.

This may seem all well and good, but there are sceptics. Some people believe

that we may never have the technology to revive the people so freezing them

is a waste of money. Cryobiologist Arthur Rowe made a famous statement that

"Believing cryonics could reanimate somebody who has been frozen is like

believing you can turn a hamburger back into a cow."

So will you be signing up to be frozen, or do you think that all the "corpsicles"

are wasting their money ? 

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