The inside world of cryonics

The concept

Cryonics is the freezing and storing of a body after death until a future medical technology can restore that person to full health. The ability to revive a person from a frozen state remains unproven.

The process

Place the body in an ice bath and gradually reduce body temperature.

Inject the body with agents that act as an antifreeze, protecting the body from the damage of becoming frozen.

Put the body into a protective insulating bag and cool it in a box surrounded by liquid nitrogen over several days until it reaches a temperature of minus-200 degrees Celsius.

The rules

Legally, cryonics cannot be performed on living people. Cryonic scientists believe at legal death, most of a person’s tissues are still alive, and by preserving them at or near the instant of legal death, doctors of the future will be able to revive them.

The players Alcor in Scottsdale, Ariz. Cryonics Institute in Clinton Township, Mich. Osiris Cryonics in Miami. KrioRus near Moscow. Oregon Cryonics does only brain preservation. Two unnamed Chinese companies.

The frozen

Dr. James Hiram Bedford, a former University of California-Berkeley psychology professor who died of renal cancer in 1967, was the first human to be cryonically preserved. He has been at Alcor since 1991.

Ted Williams, an American professional baseball player and member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, is the most famous cryogenically frozen person.

The controversy

Two of South Florida’s biggest players in the cryonics industry, William Faloon and Saul Kent, operated Life Extension Foundation. At one point, they were indicted on more than two dozen counts of conspiring, importing unapproved drugs, and disguising drugs as supplements. The U.S. Attorney’s office later dropped the charges. Faloon now operates Church of Perpetual Life in Hollywood which funds age reversal experiments.

There also have been legal battles within families over a member’s wishes for cryopreservation and damage done during the freezing process.

The facts

No animal or human frozen to cryogenic temperatures has been revived from a frozen state.

Cryonics scientists believe nanotechnology will provide techniques in the future that are not available today.

Cost and membership

Preservation and long term storage ranges from $28,000 to $200,000. Along with cost of preservation, there also is a membership cost, which could be about $120 a year. Some critics argue the structure resembles a Ponzi scheme, in which members make ongoing investments to keep original members frozen.

If you go

Cryonics Symposium International from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Church of Perpetual Life, 1855 McKinley St., Hollywood.