A REMEDY FOR DEATH

We’ve been hearing a lot recently about how tissues and organs from aborted human fetuses are valued for medical experiments. (More on that another time here.)

Those “harvested” tissues are useful, but come from aborted fetuses . . . an issue which raises a host of legal and ethical issues, and offends many people. 

What if there were a way to generate human brain tissue, not from a fetus, but from stem cells generated from healthy adults?

In other words, suppose you could let a lab technician take a small sample of the flesh on your hand, and, hey presto! you might soon have small globules of brain tissue for researchers to work with.

But then the question, Why would you want a brain in a jar? One reason, among many: if you or your children were suffering from neurological disorders or brain abnormalities, such as autism. Then there might be no need to take actual brain samples . . .  or to wait while those abnormalities are studied in experimental animals (which may or may not provide results transferable to humans).

It’s not happening full-out just yet, but the work is underway at Cambridge University by Dr. Madeline Lancaster and team. Here’s the link to the article at Singularity Hub

Another question that may come to mind: How does the possibility of growing replica human brains tie in with my medical bio-technothriller, A REMEDY FOR DEATH: Playing God with body, soul and biotech?  

Excelloent question! You'll find the answer at the top of this blog, or you can can check it out on Amazon.  I hope you will.

Hyperbaric oxygen treatment and Michael Crichton-- the two leading keywords by which people find their way to this blog. Hardly a day passes without one or the other or both listed as "referral" keywords.

Michael Crichton

 Michael Crichton  had long been one of my favorite authors--some have termed him the founder or king of the science techno-thrillers-- and so I when I find something interesting on him I usually link to it from this blog. (Sadly, he died in 2008.)  

There was quite a flurry of pieces about him in the past few months, in part because his earliest thrillers, pubished under the name John Lange, had been re-published. Partly also because of the new sequel to JURASSIC PARK, as well as a remake of WESTWORLD.

 Here's the link to an old interview with him, click to go to that page in this blog.  That will lead to some of the other Crichton articles.

But the two Michael Crichton-related posts that draw the most relate to articles on the Michael Crichton conspiracy.  Why those draw highest, over more informative interviews with him, I have no idea. 

 Hyperbaric oxygen therapy -- HBOT

Hyperbaric oxygen therapy plays a key role in the plot-line of my science techno-thriller, A REMEDY FOR DEATH, so I've been posting here links to articles from my older research, as well as newer peices that I run upon.

 This week (January 6, 2015) the Wall Street Journal ran quite a long article, "Patients take pure oxygen in off-label treatments" link. I had not known that some parents of children with autism have been using HBOT as an off-label treatment.

HBOT is also being used for FDA-approved uses including nonhealing wounds and, of course, the orignal use--treating divers with decompression problems.

Not in this article, but I have heard of other studies using high pressure oxygen therapy in fields including regenerative medicine, rejuvenating aging bodies and body parts, and other anti-aging therapies

But HBOT is being used experimentally with, in addition to treating autism, sports injuries, strokes, and various athletic injuries.  

Also, according to that WSJ article, the Defense Department has also studied the use of HBOT to treat post-concussion symptoms. DOD found no significant difference between the test group (who did receive HBO), and a control group, the members of which did not actually receive pure oxygen but were told they did.

However, seems to me that by telling the control group that little fib, the researchers were casting a shadow over the whole test. Why? I don't have time or space to get into it here, but a number of recent studies have explored the placebo and "nocebo" effect. Those studies (still underway) suggest that simply by telling the control people they were getting the treatment they may have unconsciously improved themselves.  (Granted, that is just my speculation; I haven't seen the full study. But, based on what I do know, seems to me the study invalidated itself.)

Quest to grow human organs inside pigs-- the headline says it all. Google those words ,and you'll come on many links to the same research, including Youtube and photos. 

By the way, "chimera" is the term used for human-primate hybrids -- that is chimps and the like, which are around 98% or more genetically similar to humans. I suspect the term chimera is being extended to cover other types of combinations . . . and if you Google onwards you'll see  much more. I'll add some more here another time. Another related term is "transgenic"-- also something for another time. Still another related term is "Radical life extension."

I suspect these human organs "carried" in pigs and other animals are going to become a very big deal for the regenerative medicine industry. I think they are also going to be a much-discussed topic in the area of medical and research ethics.

It's relevant here as my technothriller A REMEDY FOR DEATH begins with the attempted creation of a human-chimp hybrid.  'Nuff said.

Well, maybe not quite yet. But work is underway.

In Austria, researchers took both embryonic stem cells (i.e. from human embryos) and adult skin cells, then did some "lab magic" and in about a month the cells grew and self-orgaized into what the researchers termed "brain-like organoids" 3-4mm in size that showed "neural activity".  

Think of it!  A few flakes of skin can become the startings of a human brain. Now that's not to say that these litle bits had consciousness, that's many more steps ahead.

They have survived a year (as of when the article went to publication in the journal Nature,) but have not grown any larger, apparently because at this point there is no blood supply in. (But other research in other labs is focusing on generating bio-artificial  blood vessels.)

This work was reported on in  Britain's New Scientist , BBC News , Washington Post via Reuters , Siongularity Hub  and others .

What about the ethical issues of growing even a tiny  human brain?  The researchers are aware of the issue, and the Austrian team does not want to see larger human brain specimens grown now, as that would be "undesirable."

Gary Marcus, in a New Yorker article, looks at this same research, though taking a much longer look at the implications  of where this kind of work may lead decades or a half-century from now.

 "But we’ll also need to confront immense ethical quandaries. What rights does synthetic brain tissue have? Should a 3-D-printed brain have the right to vote? To an education? To terminate its own life? (Or to not be terminated?) For now, these questions are still just another round of thought experiments. But it’s more likely than ever that such thoughts might some day be held by just another brain in a jar."

Beyond all that, there's still one other big issue: even if we can "grow"  a complete human brain, where is the mind?   That is the biggie we tackle in  my technothriller, A REMEDY FOR DEATH --Playing God with Body, Soul, and Biotech,  . . . though suggesting an approach other than bio-science.

The header tells it all: "Organs Made to Order: It won't be long before surgeons routinely install replacement body parts created in the laboratory"

This is from the Smithsonian Magazine, and provides a brief overview of the work being done in human organ regeneration by one of the leaders in the field, Dr. Anthony Atala at Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine.  You'll pick up a feel for the approach and the terminology, and will also see some excellent photos of the work done, like this regenerated ear-in-progress.

 (Photo courtesy Smithsonian.)

Here's a link to that article

Imagine collecting a burn patient's own stem cells from an unburned part of the body, placing them in a growth solution for an hour or so, then spraying that solution of human stem cells onto the raw, burned area . . .  and in four days having the patient's skin looking fully back to normal.

Well, you don't have to imagine it, it's not future science fiction, it's here and now, as reported by National Geographic

Mind you, growing human flesh to put over burned areas is not new--among others, Organogenesis has been producing that kind of regenerated skin since the 1980s. Trouble is, that method takes weeks, and to protect the patient against infections, an "immediate" new skin is better. And it's here, though still experiemental.

Here's the link to the   National Geographic video  (via the site Big Geek Dad, which is a great source for all sorts of interesting, sometimes off-beat stuff).

It seems that few days  pass that I don't come upon some article or TV/web news report on topics relating to  my techno-thriller A REMEDY FOR DEATH (Playing God with Body, Soul and Bio-tech). Here are a few examples of what's turned up recently:

Example: about a week ago, the Wall Street Journal ran a  short piece  by Daniel Akst, "Tissue that's fit to print" on some  new work at Harvard (and a book describing that work) on the subject of using 3-D printing to create layers of tissue based on human cells.  The difficulty, until this work, has been in printing a vascular system to nourish the new tissue.

Another example: yesterday I was reading through Bloomberg Business Week (March 24-31, 2014) and came on Caroline Winter's article "Printing Medicine" on Andrew Hessel and his work at Autodesk, where theyare designing software that may help bring about cures for cancer . . . and who knows what beyond. Part of the work is done in conjunctioin with a startup named Organovo, which "uses bioprinting technology to manufacture human tissues" (see paragraph above).  

Sorry, at this point I am unable to find the online link to the article (I read it in my old-fashioned print copy!)  but I expect it will be up on Google or Bing before long.

BUT as I looked for it via Google and "printing medicine + bloomberg," I came upon not only pages upon pages of relevant articles, but particularly this one from a month or so ago, further making my opening point.  This, from Bloomberg  (that's only Bloomberg, not Bloomberg Business Week), I came on this article:  "3-D technology may someday print up new livers: health.)  

I'm running short of time at the moment, but plan in another post here to make the  link between my technothriller, A REMEDY FOR DEATH,  and how it integrates much of this new medical technology. (If I may modestly say so, the early drafts of REMEDY had concepts that pre-figured what we're reading now!  And there is still stuff in REMEDY that is way ahead of the curves of bio-tech, human stem-cell technology, the mystery of consciousness, neuroscience, tissue engineering , synthetic biology, regeneratiove medicine, the quest for immortality-- and the ethical and legal implications of putting all those pieces together.

If you're on this page, you likely know that my technothriller A REMEDY FOR DEATH deals with, among other issues, questions of medical ethics, including organ and tissue regeneration, cross-species "trading" of tissues and stem cells, and the ultimate question of, When does death in fact occur?

In this blog, I've included a lot of my earlier research used in working out A REMEDY FOR DEATH, and I'm still adding new articles and studies that I find with some or a lot of relevance to the book.

Hence you may be interested in the opinion piece in London's Daily Telegraph "Tampering with embryos is tampering with souls"  by Jacob Rees-Mogg, a member of the British parliament.  The piece picks up from a debate in the House of Parliament on the issue of  "three parent embryos – or rather mitochondrial transfer".  

Mr. Rees-Mogg points out three as-yet unsettled issues with the idea of blending "parenthood" from three people:

1. Technical: do we yet know enough about how to do this?); 
2. Ethical (involving both medical ethics and morality: "There may be unknown consequences of tampering with the genes of an embryo, and for the unreligious there will be mental issues to be faced by those who have three parents. The gravity of the change is such that it should not be made without the most careful thought and properly tested research.)
3. Legal:  "This is a self-evidently dangerous road to start down as although the technique cannot at this stage affect eye colour, eventually there will be therapies that will. Once this line has been crossed the argument against going further is merely a matter of degree rather than absolute. Its current aim is small, that ten children each year that might have been born should be replaced by ten different babies. This is not a major problem yet the solution is a fundamental change in our understanding of our own humanity."

I'm  not going to go further, except to add that in his bio, Mr. Rees-Mogg demonstrates exceptional wisdom and prudence by stating clearly " He is not on Twitter."  Amen to that! I say.

By the way, if you object to the word "soul" in his article, you're welcome to adopt the terms "conscious essence" within the "Vehicle" -- terms that some of the characters use  as alternatives to "soul" and "body" in A REMEDY FOR DEATH.

Rejuvenating  aging muscles -- I was really feeling the need for something like that this weekend in the course of my first-ever kayaking trip.  I felt my age then . . . NO, correction! I felt my age twice over.  But good news-- no after-effects the next day.

Which leads into an article I came upon, "Scientists get closer to rejuvenating aging muscles" by Mary Elizabeth Dallas, in Health Day News (which I had never run across before).

The report is on a study conducted at Stanford's Baxter Laboratory for Stem Cell Biology.  The study takes a very different approach than the fictional lab in my technothriller A REMEDY FOR DEATH, but I thought you'd find it of interest.

One thing struck me: "the muscle stem cells in 2-year old mice are the equivalent of those found in 80-year old humans." Implication: maybe there's a market for canes and walkers for old mice!  

Seriously, the process involves taking muscle stem cells from the oldsters (only mice, so far) and treat them in a certain way, then reimplanting in those muscle groups.  Two months later, those muscles were essentiall equivalent to those of young, uninjured mice.

Link to the article "Scientists get closer to rejuvenating aging muscles"

"How would you like to invest in immortality?" is just out in Fortune's on-line tech blog  (and likely in the paper edition when it arrives).

Briefly, this coming June, 32 year -old Russian tech entrepreneur/billionaire Dmitry Itskov will be announcing his launch of a venture to "allow investors to bankroll research into neuroscience and human consciousness..."

The aim is to set up a "push to understand human consciousness and ultimately how to transfer it from human bodies into robotic avatars." (Yes, that does align with Ray Kurzweil's program.)

But, Dmitry, sorry to tell you this, but this has already been done! (Albeit fictionally) in my technothriller, A REMEDY FOR DEATH: Playing God with body, soul and bio-tech.

Only REMEDY does it better (I modestly propose). I mean, who'd want to come back to find their mind transferred into a robot? A robot, good grief!  Wouldn't rich elite folks want to come back into, as one of rich guys in REMEDY puts it, into  "healthy, horny 21-year-old bodies complete with all of our  accumulated savvy from this first lifetime?"

No, seems to me that moving a "brain," a "mind," a "conscious essence" (the jargon  I use in  REMEDY) into a robot or a robotic avatar is not the way to go . . . not with all that's opening up in the fields of bioartificial organs, organ fabrication, regenerative medicine, growing body parts, and even transgenic and transhuman possibilities.

In short, wouldn't those rich elite folks really prefer to come back into a complete new body (as their present  one was in its prime), with all their present learning and experience?

Another thing:  the Fortune article suggests that  Itskov's  methodology will, "by 2025 . . .place a human brain into a working robot and have that person's consciousness (memories, personality, and everything else that makes up the 'self') transfer along with it."

But . . . um . . . how're you going to manage that? Plunking a brain into a robot (or into some kind of tank) is easy enough, but how do you get that -- dare I say the word "person" -- to turn on and come alive?  And how does that brain in the machine get to smell the flowers and do all the other little things that make life worth living?

How?  again, modestly,  I suggest you check out my technothriller A REMEDY FOR DEATH: Playing God with body, soul and bio-tech.  Probably won't get all the questions answered, but I hope it will give food for thought.