Category Archives: Cryonics

In physics, cryogenics is the production and behaviour of materials at very low temperatures. A person who studies elements that have been subjected to extremely cold temperatures is called a cryogenicist.

It is not well-defined at what point on the temperature scale refrigeration ends and cryogenics begins, but scientists assume a gas to be cryogenic if it can be liquefied at or below 150C (123K; 238F).[1] The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology has chosen to consider the field of cryogenics as that involving temperatures below 180C (93K; 292F). This is a logical dividing line, since the normal boiling points of the so-called permanent gases (such as helium, hydrogen, neon, nitrogen, oxygen, and normal air) lie below 180C while the Freon refrigerants, hydrocarbons, and other common refrigerants have boiling points above 180C.[2][3]

Discovery of superconducting materials with critical temperatures significantly above the boiling point of liquid nitrogen has provided new interest in reliable, low cost methods of producing high temperature cryogenic refrigeration. The term "high temperature cryogenic" describes temperatures ranging from above the boiling point of liquid nitrogen, 195.79C (77.36K; 320.42F), up to 50C (223K; 58F), the generally defined upper limit of study referred to as cryogenics.[4]

Cryogenicists use the Kelvin or Rankine temperature scale, both of which measure from absolute zero, rather than more usual scales such as Celsius or Fahrenheit, with their zeroes at arbitrary temperatures.

The word cryogenics stems from Greek (cryo) "cold" + (genic) "having to do with production".

Cryogenic fluids with their boiling point in kelvins.[6]

Liquefied gases, such as liquid nitrogen and liquid helium, are used in many cryogenic applications. Liquid nitrogen is the most commonly used element in cryogenics and is legally purchasable around the world. Liquid helium is also commonly used and allows for the lowest attainable temperatures to be reached.

These liquids may be stored in Dewar flasks, which are double-walled containers with a high vacuum between the walls to reduce heat transfer into the liquid. Typical laboratory Dewar flasks are spherical, made of glass and protected in a metal outer container. Dewar flasks for extremely cold liquids such as liquid helium have another double-walled container filled with liquid nitrogen. Dewar flasks are named after their inventor, James Dewar, the man who first liquefied hydrogen. Thermos bottles are smaller vacuum flasks fitted in a protective casing.

Cryogenic barcode labels are used to mark Dewar flasks containing these liquids, and will not frost over down to 195 degrees Celsius.[7]

Cryogenic transfer pumps are the pumps used on LNG piers to transfer liquefied natural gas from LNG carriers to LNG storage tanks, as are cryogenic valves.

The field of cryogenics advanced during World War II when scientists found that metals frozen to low temperatures showed more resistance to wear. Based on this theory of cryogenic hardening, the commercial cryogenic processing industry was founded in 1966 by Ed Busch. With a background in the heat treating industry, Busch founded a company in Detroit called CryoTech in 1966 [8] which merged with 300 Below in 1999 to become the world's largest and oldest commercial cryogenic processing company.[citation needed] Busch originally experimented with the possibility of increasing the life of metal tools to anywhere between 200% and 400% of the original life expectancy using cryogenic tempering instead of heat treating.[citation needed] This evolved in the late 1990s into the treatment of other parts.

Cryogens, such as liquid nitrogen, are further used for specialty chilling and freezing applications. Some chemical reactions, like those used to produce the active ingredients for the popular statin drugs, must occur at low temperatures of approximately 100C (148F). Special cryogenic chemical reactors are used to remove reaction heat and provide a low temperature environment. The freezing of foods and biotechnology products, like vaccines, requires nitrogen in blast freezing or immersion freezing systems. Certain soft or elastic materials become hard and brittle at very low temperatures, which makes cryogenic milling (cryomilling) an option for some materials that cannot easily be milled at higher temperatures.

Cryogenic processing is not a substitute for heat treatment, but rather an extension of the heatingquenchingtempering cycle. Normally, when an item is quenched, the final temperature is ambient. The only reason for this is that most heat treaters do not have cooling equipment. There is nothing metallurgically significant about ambient temperature. The cryogenic process continues this action from ambient temperature down to 320F (140R; 78K; 196C).In most instances the cryogenic cycle is followed by a heat tempering procedure. As all alloys do not have the same chemical constituents, the tempering procedure varies according to the material's chemical composition, thermal history and/or a tool's particular service application.

The entire process takes 34 days.

Another use of cryogenics is cryogenic fuels for rockets with liquid hydrogen as the most widely used example. Liquid oxygen (LOX) is even more widely used but as an oxidizer, not a fuel. NASA's workhorse space shuttle used cryogenic hydrogen/oxygen propellant as its primary means of getting into orbit. LOX is also widely used with RP-1 kerosene, a non-cryogenic hydrocarbon, such as in the rockets built for the Soviet space program by Sergei Korolev.

Russian aircraft manufacturer Tupolev developed a version of its popular design Tu-154 with a cryogenic fuel system, known as the Tu-155. The plane uses a fuel referred to as liquefied natural gas or LNG, and made its first flight in 1989.

Some applications of cryogenics:

Cryogenic cooling of devices and material is usually achieved via the use of liquid nitrogen, liquid helium, or a mechanical cryocooler (which uses high pressure helium lines). Gifford-McMahon cryocoolers, pulse tube cryocoolers and Stirling cryocoolers are in wide use with selection based on required base temperature and cooling capacity. The most recent development in cryogenics is the use of magnets as regenerators as well as refrigerators. These devices work on the principle known as the magnetocaloric effect.

There are various cryogenic detectors which are used to detect cryogenic particles.

For cryogenic temperature measurement down to 30K, Pt100 sensors, a resistance temperature detector (RTD), are used. For temperatures lower than 30K it is necessary to use a silicon diode for accuracy.

See the original post here:
Cryogenics - Wikipedia

Cryo-preservation or cryo-conservation is a process where organelles, cells, tissues, extracellular matrix, organs or any other biological constructs susceptible to damage caused by unregulated chemical kinetics are preserved by cooling to very low temperatures[1] (typically 80C using solid carbon dioxide or 196C using liquid nitrogen). At low enough temperatures, any enzymatic or chemical activity which might cause damage to the biological material in question is effectively stopped. Cryopreservation methods seek to reach low temperatures without causing additional damage caused by the formation of ice crystals during freezing. Traditional cryopreservation has relied on coating the material to be frozen with a class of molecules termed cryoprotectants. New methods are constantly being investigated due to the inherent toxicity of many cryoprotectants.[2] By default it should be considered that cryopreservation alters or compromises the structure and function of cells unless it is proven otherwise for a particular cell population. Cryoconservation of animal genetic resources is the process in which animal genetic material is collected and stored with the intention of conservation of the breed.

Water-bears (Tardigrada), microscopic multicellular organisms, can survive freezing by replacing most of their internal water with the sugar trehalose, preventing it from crystallization that otherwise damages cell membranes. Mixtures of solutes can achieve similar effects. Some solutes, including salts, have the disadvantage that they may be toxic at intense concentrations. In addition to the water-bear, wood frogs can tolerate the freezing of their blood and other tissues. Urea is accumulated in tissues in preparation for overwintering, and liver glycogen is converted in large quantities to glucose in response to internal ice formation. Both urea and glucose act as "cryoprotectants" to limit the amount of ice that forms and to reduce osmotic shrinkage of cells. Frogs can survive many freeze/thaw events during winter if no more than about 65% of the total body water freezes. Research exploring the phenomenon of "freezing frogs" has been performed primarily by the Canadian researcher, Dr. Kenneth B. Storey.[citation needed]

Freeze tolerance, in which organisms survive the winter by freezing solid and ceasing life functions, is known in a few vertebrates: five species of frogs (Rana sylvatica, Pseudacris triseriata, Hyla crucifer, Hyla versicolor, Hyla chrysoscelis), one of salamanders (Hynobius keyserlingi), one of snakes (Thamnophis sirtalis) and three of turtles (Chrysemys picta, Terrapene carolina, Terrapene ornata).[3] Snapping turtles Chelydra serpentina and wall lizards Podarcis muralis also survive nominal freezing but it has not been established to be adaptive for overwintering. In the case of Rana sylvatica one cryopreservant is ordinary glucose, which increases in concentration by approximately 19mmol/l when the frogs are cooled slowly.[3]

One of the most important early theoreticians of cryopreservation was James Lovelock. In 1953, he suggested that damage to red blood cells during freezing was due to osmotic stress,[4] and that increasing the salt concentration in a dehydrating cell might damage it.[5][6] In the mid-1950s, he experimented with the cryopreservation of rodents, determining that hamsters could be frozen with 60% of the water in the brain crystallized into ice with no adverse effects; other organs were shown to be susceptible to damage.[7] This work led other scientists to attempt the short-term freezing of rats by 1955, which were fully active 4 to 7 days after being revived.[8]

Cryopreservation was applied to humans beginning in 1954 with three pregnancies resulting from the insemination of previously frozen sperm.[9] Fowl sperm was cryopreserved in 1957 by a team of scientists in the UK directed by Christopher Polge.[10] However, the rapid immersion of the samples in liquid nitrogen did not, for certain samplessuch as some types of embryos, bone marrow and stem cellsproduce the necessary viability to make them usable after thawing. Increased understanding of the mechanism of freezing injury to cells emphasised the importance of controlled or slow cooling to obtain maximum survival on thawing of the living cells. A controlled-rate cooling process, allowing biological samples to equilibrate to optimal physical parameters osmotically in a cryoprotectant (a form of anti-freeze) before cooling in a predetermined, controlled way proved necessary. The ability of cryoprotectants, in the early cases glycerol, to protect cells from freezing injury was discovered accidentally. Freezing injury has two aspects: direct damage from the ice crystals and secondary damage caused by the increase in concentration of solutes as progressively more ice is formed. During 1963, Peter Mazur, at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the U.S., demonstrated that lethal intracellular freezing could be avoided if cooling was slow enough to permit sufficient water to leave the cell during progressive freezing of the extracellular fluid. That rate differs between cells of differing size and water permeability: a typical cooling rate around 1C/minute is appropriate for many mammalian cells after treatment with cryoprotectants such as glycerol or dimethyl sulphoxide, but the rate is not a universal optimum.[11]

Storage at very low temperatures is presumed to provide an indefinite longevity to cells, although the actual effective life is rather difficult to prove. Researchers experimenting with dried seeds found that there was noticeable variability of deterioration when samples were kept at different temperatures even ultra-cold temperatures. Temperatures less than the glass transition point (Tg) of polyol's water solutions, around 136C (137K; 213F), seem to be accepted as the range where biological activity very substantially slows, and 196C (77K; 321F), the boiling point of liquid nitrogen, is the preferred temperature for storing important specimens. While refrigerators, freezers and extra-cold freezers are used for many items, generally the ultra-cold of liquid nitrogen is required for successful preservation of the more complex biological structures to virtually stop all biological activity.

Phenomena which can cause damage to cells during cryopreservation mainly occur during the freezing stage, and include: solution effects, extracellular ice formation, dehydration and intracellular ice formation. Many of these effects can be reduced by cryoprotectants.Once the preserved material has become frozen, it is relatively safe from further damage. However, estimates based on the accumulation of radiation-induced DNA damage during cryonic storage have suggested a maximum storage period of 1000 years.[12]

The main techniques to prevent cryopreservation damages are a well established combination of controlled rate and slow freezing and a newer flash-freezing process known as vitrification.

Controlled-rate and slow freezing, also known as slow programmable freezing (SPF),[13] is a set of well established techniques developed during the early 1970s which enabled the first human embryo frozen birth Zoe Leyland during 1984. Since then, machines that freeze biological samples using programmable sequences, or controlled rates, have been used all over the world for human, animal and cell biology "freezing down" a sample to better preserve it for eventual thawing, before it is frozen, or cryopreserved, in liquid nitrogen. Such machines are used for freezing oocytes, skin, blood products, embryo, sperm, stem cells and general tissue preservation in hospitals, veterinary practices and research laboratories around the world. As an example, the number of live births from frozen embryos 'slow frozen' is estimated at some 300,000 to 400,000 or 20% of the estimated 3 million in vitro fertilisation (IVF) births.[14]

Lethal intracellular freezing can be avoided if cooling is slow enough to permit sufficient water to leave the cell during progressive freezing of the extracellular fluid. To minimize the growth of extracellular ice crystal growth and recrystallization,[15] biomaterials such as alginates, polyvinyl alcohol or chitosan can be used to impede ice crystal growth along with traditional small molecule cryoprotectants.[16] That rate differs between cells of differing size and water permeability: a typical cooling rate of about 1C/minute is appropriate for many mammalian cells after treatment with cryoprotectants such as glycerol or dimethyl sulfoxide, but the rate is not a universal optimum. The 1C / minute rate can be achieved by using devices such as a rate-controlled freezer or a benchtop portable freezing container.[17]

Several independent studies have provided evidence that frozen embryos stored using slow-freezing techniques may in some ways be 'better' than fresh in IVF. The studies indicate that using frozen embryos and eggs rather than fresh embryos and eggs reduced the risk of stillbirth and premature delivery though the exact reasons are still being explored.

Researchers Greg Fahy and William F. Rall helped to introduce vitrification to reproductive cryopreservation in the mid-1980s.[18] As of 2000, researchers claim vitrification provides the benefits of cryopreservation without damage due to ice crystal formation.[19] The situation became more complex with the development of tissue engineering as both cells and biomaterials need to remain ice-free to preserve high cell viability and functions, integrity of constructs and structure of biomaterials. Vitrification of tissue engineered constructs was first reported by Lilia Kuleshova,[20] who also was the first scientist to achieve vitrification of oocytes, which resulted in live birth in 1999.[21] For clinical cryopreservation, vitrification usually requires the addition of cryoprotectants prior to cooling. The cryoprotectants act like antifreeze: they decrease the freezing temperature. They also increase the viscosity. Instead of crystallizing, the syrupy solution becomes an amorphous iceit vitrifies. Rather than a phase change from liquid to solid by crystallization, the amorphous state is like a "solid liquid", and the transformation is over a small temperature range described as the "glass transition" temperature.

Vitrification of water is promoted by rapid cooling, and can be achieved without cryoprotectants by an extremely rapid decrease of temperature (megakelvins per second). The rate that is required to attain glassy state in pure water was considered to be impossible until 2005.[22]

Two conditions usually required to allow vitrification are an increase of the viscosity and a decrease of the freezing temperature. Many solutes do both, but larger molecules generally have a larger effect, particularly on viscosity. Rapid cooling also promotes vitrification.

For established methods of cryopreservation, the solute must penetrate the cell membrane in order to achieve increased viscosity and decrease freezing temperature inside the cell. Sugars do not readily permeate through the membrane. Those solutes that do, such as dimethyl sulfoxide, a common cryoprotectant, are often toxic in intense concentration. One of the difficult compromises of vitrifying cryopreservation concerns limiting the damage produced by the cryoprotectant itself due to cryoprotectant toxicity. Mixtures of cryoprotectants and the use of ice blockers have enabled the Twenty-First Century Medicine company to vitrify a rabbit kidney to 135C with their proprietary vitrification mixture. Upon rewarming, the kidney was transplanted successfully into a rabbit, with complete functionality and viability, able to sustain the rabbit indefinitely as the sole functioning kidney.[23]

Generally, cryopreservation is easier for thin samples and small clumps of individual cells, because these can be cooled more quickly and so require lesser doses of toxic cryoprotectants. Therefore, cryopreservation of human livers and hearts for storage and transplant is still impractical.

Nevertheless, suitable combinations of cryoprotectants and regimes of cooling and rinsing during warming often allow the successful cryopreservation of biological materials, particularly cell suspensions or thin tissue samples. Examples include:

Additionally, efforts are underway to preserve humans cryogenically, known as cryonics. For such efforts either the brain within the head or the entire body may experience the above process. Cryonics is in a different category from the aforementioned examples, however: while countless cryopreserved cells, vaccines, tissue and other biological samples have been thawed and used successfully, this has not yet been the case at all for cryopreserved brains or bodies. At issue are the criteria for defining "success".

Proponents of cryonics claim that cryopreservation using present technology, particularly vitrification of the brain, may be sufficient to preserve people in an "information theoretic" sense so that they could be revived and made whole by hypothetical vastly advanced future technology. Not only is there no guarantee of its success, many people[who?] argue that human cryopreservation is unethical. According to certain views[which?] of the mind body problem, some philosophers[who?] believe that the mind, which contains thoughts, memories, and personality, is separate from the brain. When someone dies, their mind leaves the body. If a cryopreserved patient gets successfully resuscitated, no one knows if they would be the same person that they once were or if they would be an empty shell of the memory of who they once were.[improper synthesis?]

Right now scientists are trying to see if transplanting cryopreserved human organs for transplantation is viable, if so this would be a major step forward for the possibility of reviving a cryopreserved human.[25]

Cryopreservation for embryos is used for embryo storage, e.g., when in vitro fertilization (IVF) has resulted in more embryos than is currently needed.

Pregnancies have been reported from embryos stored for 16 years.[26] Many studies have evaluated the children born from frozen embryos, or frosties. The result has been uniformly positive with no increase in birth defects or development abnormalities.[27] A study of more than 11,000 cryopreserved human embryos showed no significant effect of storage time on post-thaw survival for IVF or oocyte donation cycles, or for embryos frozen at the pronuclear or cleavage stages.[28] Additionally, the duration of storage did not have any significant effect on clinical pregnancy, miscarriage, implantation, or live birth rate, whether from IVF or oocyte donation cycles.[28] Rather, oocyte age, survival proportion, and number of transferred embryos are predictors of pregnancy outcome.[28]

Cryopreservation of ovarian tissue is of interest to women who want to preserve their reproductive function beyond the natural limit, or whose reproductive potential is threatened by cancer therapy,[29] for example in hematologic malignancies or breast cancer.[30] The procedure is to take a part of the ovary and perform slow freezing before storing it in liquid nitrogen whilst therapy is undertaken. Tissue can then be thawed and implanted near the fallopian, either orthotopic (on the natural location) or heterotopic (on the abdominal wall),[30] where it starts to produce new eggs, allowing normal conception to occur.[31] The ovarian tissue may also be transplanted into mice that are immunocompromised (SCID mice) to avoid graft rejection, and tissue can be harvested later when mature follicles have developed.[32]

Human oocyte cryopreservation is a new technology in which a womans eggs (oocytes) are extracted, frozen and stored. Later, when she is ready to become pregnant, the eggs can be thawed, fertilized, and transferred to the uterus as embryos.Since 1999, when the birth of the first baby from an embryo derived from vitrified-warmed womans eggs was reported by Kuleshova and co-workers in the journal of Human Reproduction,[20] this concept has been recognized and widespread. This break-through in achieving vitrification of womans oocytes made an important advance in our knowledge and practice of the IVF process, as clinical pregnancy rate is four times higher after oocyte vitrification than after slow freezing.[33] Oocyte vitrification is vital for preservation fertility in young oncology patients and for individuals undergoing IVF who object, either for religious or ethical reasons, to the practice of freezing embryos.

Semen can be used successfully almost indefinitely after cryopreservation. The longest reported successful storage is 22 years.[34] It can be used for sperm donation where the recipient wants the treatment in a different time or place, or as a means of preserving fertility for men undergoing vasectomy or treatments that may compromise their fertility, such as chemotherapy, radiation therapy or surgery.

Cryopreservation of immature testicular tissue is a developing method to avail reproduction to young boys who need to have gonadotoxic therapy. Animal data are promising, since healthy offsprings have been obtained after transplantation of frozen testicular cell suspensions or tissue pieces. However, none of the fertility restoration options from frozen tissue, i.e. cell suspension transplantation, tissue grafting and in vitro maturation (IVM) has proved efficient and safe in humans as yet.[35]

Cryopreservation of whole moss plants, especially Physcomitrella patens, has been developed by Ralf Reski and coworkers[36] and is performed at the International Moss Stock Center. This biobank collects, preserves, and distributes moss mutants and moss ecotypes.[37]

MSCs, when transfused immediately within a few hours post-thawing, may show reduced function or show decreased efficacy in treating diseases as compared to those MSCs which are in log phase of cell growth (fresh). As a result, cryopreserved MSCs should be brought back into log phase of cell growth in in vitro culture before these are administered for clinical trials or experimental therapies. Re-culturing of MSCs will help in recovering from the shock the cells get during freezing and thawing. Various clinical trials on MSCs have failed which used cryopreserved products immediately post-thaw as compared to those clinical trials which used fresh MSCs.[38]

Bacteria and fungi can be kept short-term (months to about a year, depending) refrigerated, however, cell division and metabolism is not completely arrested and thus is not an optimal option for long-term storage (years) or to preserve cultures genetically or phenotypically, as cell divisions can lead to mutations or sub-culturing can cause phenotypic changes. A preferred option, species-dependent, is cryopreservation. Nematode worms are the only multicellular eukaryotes that have been shown to survive cryopreservation. [39][40]

Fungi, notably zygomycetes, ascomycetes and higher basidiomycetes, regardless of sporulation, are able to be stored in liquid nitrogen or deep-frozen. Crypreservation is a hallmark method for fungi that do not sporulate (otherwise other preservation methods for spores can be used at lower costs and ease), sporulate but have delicate spores (large or freeze-dry sensitive), are pathogenic (dangerous to keep metabolically active fungus) or are to be used for genetic stocks (ideally to have identical composition as the original deposit). As with many other organisms, cryoprotectants like DMSO or glycerol (e.g. filamentous fungi 10% glycerol or yeast 20% glycerol) are used. Differences between choosing cryoprotectants are species (or class) dependent, but generally for fungi penetrating cryoprotectants like DMSO, glycerol or polyethylene glycol are most effective (other non-penetrating ones include sugars mannitol, sorbitol, dextran, etc.). Freeze-thaw repetition is not recommended as it can decrease viability. Back-up deep-freezers or liquid nitrogen storage sites are recommended. Multiple protocols for freezing are summarized below (each uses screw-cap polypropylene cryotubes):[41]

Many common culturable laboratory strains are deep-frozen to preserve genetically and phenotypically stable, long-term stocks. Sub-culturing and prolonged refrigerated samples may lead to loss of plasmid(s) or mutations. Common final glycerol percentages are 15, 20 and 25. From a fresh culture plate, one single colony of interest is chosen and liquid culture is made. From the liquid culture, the medium is directly mixed with equal amount of glycerol; the colony should be checked for any defects like mutations. All antibiotics should be washed from the culture before long-term storage. Methods vary, but mixing can be done gently by inversion or rapidly by vortex and cooling can vary by either placing the cryotube directly at 50 to 95C, shock-freezing in liquid nitrogen or gradually cooling and then storing at 80C or cooler (liquid nitrogen or liquid nitrogen vapor). Recovery of bacteria can also vary, namely if beads are stored within the tube then the few beads can be used to plate or the frozen stock can be scraped with a loop and then plated, however, since only little stock is needed the entire tube should never be completely thawed and repeated freeze-thaw should be avoided. 100% recovery is not feasible regardless of methodology.[42][43][44]

The microscopic soil-dwelling nematode roundworms Panagrolaimus detritophagus and Plectus parvus are the only eukaryotic organisms that have been proven to be viable after long-term cryopreservation to date. In this case, the preservation was natural rather than artificial, due to permafrost.

See the original post here:
Cryopreservation - Wikipedia

Stability, Safety, And Security

We have a proven track record of financial security and stability, as well as price stability. CI is the only cryonics organization with no debt, no stockholders, and no landlords. We own our patient care facilities outright, and all of our member officers and directors donate their services voluntarily. We're one of the oldest cryonics organizations in existence -- and the only such organization that has never raised its prices, even in high-inflation times like the late 70s and early 80s. Adjusting for inflation, our prices have actually steadily declined, and we hope to continue that trend.

As members, each and every one of us has a vested interest in the long-term viability of our organization - our facilities, cryostats and finances are built to last into the future we're striving toward.

We have a flexible and rapid system of emergency patient care based on widely available networks of mortuary assistance. This means that in the critical early stages, we can bring qualified professionals to you throughout most of the world. In particular, London-based F.A. Albin & Sons funeral directors are trained, practiced, equipped, and prepared to fly a team anywhere in Europe on short notice to help European CI members, tourists or business travellers.

Our prices are lower than any other organization in fact, the most affordable prices anywhere in the world. This is in keeping with our membership philosophy to provide ourselves reliable cryonic services at a reasonable and affordable cost. If we were to raise prices, we'd only be charging ourselves more.

Our minimum whole-body suspension fee is $28,000. (For members at a distance, transportation costs and local help will be additional.) Our $28,000 fee is a one-time only payment, with no subsequent charges. It's easily funded by insurance or other means. (For last-minute cases, where the patient was not signed up beforehand, we ordinarily charge $35,000 rather than $28,000, if arrangements can be worked out at all.)

Does that lower fee mean lower quality patient care or services? Absolutely not. We believe that our non-profit status allows us to more successfully control costs. We believe that specific methods and research offered by alternative cryonics organizations differ only slightly from ours and that our procedures and policies give an equal or better chance for patient survival than competing organizations.

See for yourself. Read our FAQ and review "The CI Advantage." Remember, many CI members could afford the higher prices of other organizations for themselves and their families, but we've chosen CI because we know it's our best bet. And yours.

CI Membership

Details on joining the Cryonics Institute. We offer Annual (yearly) or Lifetime Membership options. Please note, ONLY members are eligible for the cryonics services provided by CI.

CI Membership Worldwide

The Cryonics Institute (CI) welcomes those living outside the United States to join us as as Members. We offer human cryopreservation, pet cryopreservation and tissue/DNA cryopreservation to CI Members around the world.

Membership Statistics

Details on CI's worldwide membership, including a breakdown by Country.

Cryopreservation Patient Details

A complete listing of patients curently in cryopreservation at CI's Michigan facility.

Human Cryostatis

CI's premier service is human cryopreservation, using state-of-the-art techniques and equipment to ensure optimal suspensions. CI only performs full-body suspensions, and at a fraction of the cost of other companies' "Neuro" (head only) suspensions.

DNA/Tissue Freezing

CI also offers DNA Preservation as a simpler and more economical cryopreservation option for members.

Pet Cryopreservation

Life-extension possibilities for beloved pets.

Memorabilia Storage

Secure perpetual storage for essential personal documents and keepsakes.

Optional Standby Service through Suspended Animation, Inc.

Third-Party Standby, Stabilization and Transport services are available to CI Members through an arrangement with SA inc.

Emergency Jewelry and Wallet Cards

Cryonics emergency necklaces and/or bracelets are available for Cryonics Institute (CI) Members who have made all the necessary arrangements to be cryopreserved by CI. These items include important information to help expedite local help in a cryonics emergency.

CI's state-of-the-art equipment ensures optimal cryonic suspensions.

Please see our extensive Resources Library for a deeper look into Cryonics and the Cryonics Institute. The library includes sample forms, internet links, equipment and procedure details and much more.

More:
About CI | Cryonics Institute

Cryonics is the science of preserving a human or other organism in stasis for extended periods of time. It is often mistaken for cryogenics, which is merely the study of cold on materials.

The goal of cryonics is to allow an individual to "sleep" through long intervals of time, without suffering the effects of biological aging, and then allow them to wake up again without ill effects. Cryonic suspension can reduce the human body's metabolism to near zero, thus preventing aging and eliminating the body's need for oxygen, food, and warmth. The UNSC uses cryonic storage pods in most warships, maintaining only skeleton crews until the vessel reaches their target zone.[1] The majority of personnel are placed in cryonic suspension for any voyage over 120 hours to prevent aging during the journey and to conserve onboard resources.[2]

The Covenant have not been observed using comparable technology; their starships' dramatically higher velocities in slipspace would render the use of stasis unnecessary in most cases. The Forerunners used a system similar in practice, but using a timelocked slipspace field to store the personnel within the pod instead of freezing them.[3]

Individuals enter cryonic suspension without any clothing. This is because clothing tends to bond to the skin at extremely low temperatures.[2] Individuals who disregard this and enter cryo-sleep with clothing or bandages will often awake to find their skin blistered and raw.[4] However, dedicated form-fitting full-body suits specifically designed for use in cryo can be worn without the ill effects of normal clothing, though the use of such suits is not very widespread within the UNSC military.[5] Spartans are also able to enter cryo with their Mjolnir armor on.[6][7]

The "put-down" cycle takes seven minutes.[2] During the first four minutes anesthetic gas causes the subject to become drowsy. Then another gas reacts to form a bronchial surfactant when inhaled, coating the passages of the lungs to help ensure a smooth wake cycle.

Cytoprethaline, a drug used by the UNSC during cryo-sleep, prevents damage to the occupants' cell membranes caused by ice crystal formation. It is recommended that a doctor administer the drug, but most of the time the shot is administered by a medic or by a pre-measured self-injector.[2] Some humans, such as Thomas Lasky, exhibit a rare allergic reaction to cytoprethaline. Due to the frequent use of cryosleep in the UNSC during interstellar voyages, severe instances of such condition are grounds for a medical discharge from UNSC service.[8] Spartan-IIs generally entered cryosleep without receiving cytoprethaline, but due to their augmentations, the Spartans likely did not need to receive such medication.[6]

Once the subject is prepped, the chamber automatically proceeds to the freezing stage. The unit begins to rapidly cool the body and administers an electric current that precisely counters the normal wave across the heart muscle, stopping its rhythm. The unit reaches the optimal storage temperature in three minutes.[2]

Some subjects report dreaming in cryo-sleep, but scientists maintain that dreaming in this state is physically impossible due to the cessation of neurochemical processes in the brain. The likely explanation is that most subjects experience a burst of REM sleep during the wake cycle; subjects erroneously attribute these dreams to their cryo-sleep time.[9]

Once started, the wake cycle takes approximately fifteen minutes to complete. The subject is warmed in a controlled manner and an electric current is applied to stimulate the heart muscle. The lid of the chamber will open automatically when the cycle is completed, and the interior lighting increases to full brightness. Most sleepers do not awaken until this time.[9]

When awakening, sleepers are required to sit erect in the chamber, take one breath, and cough. This first breath may be laborious to draw, but it is imperative to clear the lungs of surplus surfactant immediately.[9] The surfactant is designed to be immediately swallowed in order to replace nutrients lost during the journey.[10] Some UNSC personnel find the taste of the surfactant to be unpleasant.

If time is not of the essence, personnel may utilize the showers located adjacent to the cryo-bay deck. On military vessels, barracks and weapon lockers are often located near the cryo-deck so waking troops can be rapidly dressed and equipped for combat.[9]

Accelerated waking, known as "flash thawing" is dangerous and has a high mortality rate, and is therefore only invoked in the most dire of emergencies. Emergency heating coilscoupled with a rapid infusion of stimulants, notably adrenalinecan bring a subject out of cryo-sleep in less than five minutes. In such cases, the subject's effectiveness is reduced for several hours and he or she is often disoriented.[9]

SPARTAN-II's are augmented and specially trained to respond well to flash-thawing, and as a result suffer almost no ill effects.[9]

If a subject fails to wake up, a medical resuscitation package is located at the end of each row of cryogenic chambers. All UNSC personnel are trained to use the device, which includes a heart stimulator and breathing mask. If the subject cannot be revived, the lid of the chamber should be closed, and the emergency freezing cycle activated. A physician should attend to the subject prior to subsequent reawakening.[9]

Aside from being used to preserve humans in long-term voyages, cryonic technology can also be used as a weapon. The UNSC Spirit of Fire's AI Serina created prototype designs for cryo weapons over the ship's 28-year voyage, such as the ZAV-48 Frostraven and a modified M400 Kodiak. The GBU-1105 bomb, colloquially referred to as the "Cryo Bomb", is a weapon developed with the intention of freezing an area. Specialised detachments of Hellbringers known as Cryo Troopers utilise cryogenic weapons. A list of weapons and vehicles utilising Cryonic technology can be found here.

Continued here:
Cryonics - Halopedia, the Halo encyclopedia

Cryonics is an effort to save lives by using temperatures so cold that a person beyond help by today's medicine might be preserved for decades or centuries until a future medical technology can restore that person to full health. Cryonics is a second chance at life. It is the reasoned belief in the advancement of future medicinal technologies being able to cure things we cant today.

Many biological specimens, including whole insects, many types of human tissue including brain tissue, and human embryos have been cryogenically preserved, stored at liquid nitrogen temperature where all decay ceases, and revived. This leads scientists to believe that the same can be done with whole human bodies, and that any minimal harm can be reversed with future advancements in medicine.

Neurosurgeons often cool patients bodies so they can operate on aneurysms without damaging or rupturing the nearby blood vessels. Human embryos that are frozen in fertility clinics, defrosted, and implanted in a mothers uterus grow into perfectly normal human beings. This method isnt new or groundbreaking- successful cryopreservation of human embryos was first reported in 1983 by Trounson and Mohr with multicellular embryos that had been slow-cooled using dimethyl sulphoxide (DMSO).

And just in Feb. of 2016, there was a cryonics breakthrough when for the first time, scientists vitrified a rabbits brain and, after warming it back up, showed that it was in near perfect condition. This was the first time a cryopreservation was provably able to protect everything associated with learning and memory.

Read more here:
Osiris Cryonics

Cryonics is a fascinating concept that has inspired the imagination and dreams of thousands of people worldwide. If you're someone interested in the theory, remarkable potential and practical applications of cryonics, joining CI is a great way to learn more and get involved in the cryonics movement. Our members come from all walks of life and from all around the world, united by our interest in cryonics and the potential benefits it holds for ourselves and for all mankind.

As a member, you will be one of the owners and operators of the Cryonics Institute, as we are wholly owned and operated by our membership. CI is run by a Board of Directors elected exclusively from our members, by our members - so we have no outside investors, managers or other parties dictating our operations. Our responsibilities are to our patients, our membership, and to advancing our founder Robert Ettinger's vision. CI membership is an excellent starting point for anyone interested in cryonics to learn more and be part of an exciting, potentially world-changing community of forward-thinking people. There are no specific duties or formal responsibilities required for membership, apart from applying and paying the membership fees. However a large number of our members take a more active role in the organization either as officially elected Officers or as volunteers. How active you choose to be is completely up to your own discretion.

Please note, Cryonics Institute Membership is required if you are actively planning cryonic suspension services for yourself or a loved one through CI. Our "Members-Only" policy for cryonic services helps ensure the quality of our suspensions, and maintains the integrity of our organization and operations. CI is our organization and as member-owners it's clearly in our own best interests to manage it efficiently and especially to insure the highest standards for our suspension arrangements.

There are two classes of CI Membership. A Lifetime Member pays a one-time fee of $1,250 and can arrange for cryopreservation at CI for $28,000, usually by making CI the beneficiary of a life insurance policy. Other close family members can join for an additional $625 (there is no charge for minor children). An Annual (or Yearly) Member pays a $75 initiation fee plus $120 yearly (or $35 quarterly) and can arrange for cryopreservation at CI for $35,000. Every Yearly Membership family member must pay the same price. Neither of these fees include the cost of preparation or shipment by a local funeral director, which must be arranged separately (often with a Local Help Rider). To join, simply fill out a membership form for the type of membership you desire, Annual ($120/year recurring) or Lifetime ($1,250 one time.) The forms are available below or can be mailed on request.

To learn more about membership options and details, please see our Frequently Asked Questions. We also provide a special Membership Outreach program that gives you the opportunity to speak one-on-one with a current CI member who will help answer your questions via phone or email.

Read the rest here:
Membership | Cryonics Institute