July 25, 1998 (UPI Spotlight)
Iceman's fat cells well-preserved
INNSBRUCK, Austria, July 25, (UPI) - Scientists say (Saturday) they have discovered ``extraordinarily well preserved'' fatty materials in the brain and thigh of the ``Tyrolean Ice Man,'' who died 5,300 years ago and whose frozen body was found in the Alps in September 1991. Writing in the journal Current Biology, Dr. Michael Hess of the University of Innsbruck expressed surprise that some subcellular remains were so well preserved and ``still display outstanding structural and molecular integrity.''
Much of course is missing from this brief report, and we should not read too much into it. Nevertheless, it provides a bit more support for the cryonics optimists, who think the chance of revival is good even for patients frozen under much less than optimal conditions.
After all, this ancient individual was frozen with no special treatment or preparation or cryoprotectant whatsoever, and remained at relatively very high temperatures for a very long time, and yet destruction was far from complete.
We will continue to work toward improvement of procedures--but will also continue to regard with guarded optimism even our worst cases.
Cryonics Institute