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United States Science

Biotech Company To Attempt Revitalizing Nervous Systems of Brain-Dead Patients (telegraph.co.uk) 119

Posted by msmash from the groundbreaking-project dept.
Sarah Knapton, writing for The Telegraph: A groundbreaking trial to see if it is possible to regenerate the brains of dead people, has won approval from health watchdogs. A biotech company called BioQuark in the U.S. has been granted ethical permission to recruit 20 patients who have been declared clinically dead from a traumatic brain injury, to test whether parts of their central nervous system can be brought back to life. Scientists will use a combination of therapies, which include injecting the brain with stem cells and a cocktail of peptides, as well as deploying lasers and nerve stimulation techniques which have been shown to bring patients out of comas. The trial participants will have been certified dead and only kept alive through life support. They will be monitored for several months using brain imaging equipment to look for signs of regeneration, particularly in the upper spinal cord -- the lowest region of the brain stem which controls independent breathing and heartbeat.
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Biotech Company To Attempt Revitalizing Nervous Systems of Brain-Dead Patients More

Biotech Company To Attempt Revitalizing Nervous Systems of Brain-Dead Patients

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  • ..so, T.A.H.I.T.I. ? (Score:3, Funny)

    by kheldan ( 1460303 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @01:16PM (#52037523) Journal
    I hear it's a magical place.
    • Damnit.. it's T.A.H.I.T.I. Protocol, not just T.A.H.I.T.I.. Mod me down, to (-1, Screwed Up The Joke). :-(
      • Because I can't comment and keep the moderation (even if I post anonymous) I think it will serve better to offer a bit of reassurance. Specifying that T.A.H.I.T.I. was a protocol actually is what breaks the joke. Remember, early on in the series Coulson and everyone without clearance around him only knew that after he was killed in Avengers he went to Tahiti for a miraculous recovery. It wasn't till near the climax of the season that he and the team found out what T.A.H.I.T.I. really was.
    • Although the general ethical considerations are quite horrendous. If they do find a reliable way to reverse brain death in an appropriately preserved body then this could have massive implications for cryogenics and open up an entirely new field of Long Haul Surgery.

  • Get ready for it. (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    "This research headed by Dr. Herbert West of Miskatonic University...."

  • seen it.

  • Republicans stumble around while rejoicing, and repeatedly banging into walls.

  • From whom?

    Would that be an ethics board consisting of investors, politicians, or an objective mix of both?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sinij ( 911942 )

      Granted ethical permission. From whom?

      Groans, grunting, and uttering of 'Brains!' from the patient were interpreted as an informed consent for the procedure.

    • From the article:

      "The ReAnima Project has just received approach from an Institutional Review Board at the National Institutes of Health in the US and in India, and the team plans to start recruiting patients immediately."

      I'm not British, so maybe it's isn't a mistake but I think the word "approach" should have been "approval".

      Basically, they got IRB approval for the study. They mention NIH, because the NIH's Office of Science Policy has rules and criteria for the formation of hospital's or university's IRB

  • and it didn't end well for the living.

  • You will be forced to live forever [hermiene.net]!

  • That must be the real deal! Just how they show it in the movies!

  • The ultimate terror: Locked-in syndrome (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I'm frightened that they'll turn comatose/brain-dead people into locked-in [wikipedia.org] people. I consider the latter a fate worse than death.

    • Re:The ultimate terror: Locked-in syndrome (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Wycliffe ( 116160 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @02:08PM (#52037977) Homepage

      I'm frightened that they'll turn comatose/brain-dead people into locked-in [wikipedia.org] people. I consider the latter a fate worse than death.

      I was thinking something similar. What exactly happens if they get this person 10% functioning again? Is euthanasia legal for someone previously declared dead or are they now forced to keep this half alive person alive? What if they regain their brain but not their memory (see the book Worthing Saga). Is this a desirable outcome where you have an adult with the brain of an infant that now has to relearn everything? Even if it's 100% and they can eventually return to normal intelligence, you now have 10+ years of learning to walk, read, write, and all the other things we learn in childhood. I'm not even sure that is a desirable outcome.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Nemyst ( 1383049 )
        On the other hand, we have no idea how these people are as it is. They are declared "brain dead", but are they actually brain dead, or just unable to react to any stimulus? Could we actually free them from their bodily prison with this sort of work? There has been research showing that people previously thought to be brain dead could actually be communicated with using fMRI's combined with very specific setups (basically telling the person to think of something specific for yes and of something completely d

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by amorsen ( 7485 )

          There has been research showing that people previously thought to be brain dead could actually be communicated with using fMRI's combined with very specific setups (basically telling the person to think of something specific for yes and of something completely different for no, then analyzing the scans to determine the answer).

          No. No there has not. Brain dead people really are brain dead, their brains are not showing activity on scans. Otherwise they wouldn't be brain dead.

          There has been studies showing that locked-in people can actually communicate using fMRI scans. But they're locked-in, not brain dead.

      • I'm frightened that they'll turn comatose/brain-dead people into locked-in [wikipedia.org] people. I consider the latter a fate worse than death.

        I was thinking something similar. What exactly happens if they get this person 10% functioning again? Is euthanasia legal for someone previously declared dead or are they now forced to keep this half alive person alive? What if they regain their brain but not their memory (see the book Worthing Saga). Is this a desirable outcome where you have an adult with the brain of an infant that now has to relearn everything? Even if it's 100% and they can eventually return to normal intelligence, you now have 10+ years of learning to walk, read, write, and all the other things we learn in childhood. I'm not even sure that is a desirable outcome.

        Memory, intelligence, and many basic functions are unlikely to "come back".

        These are patients who died of a TBI – on which severed the spinal cord from the brain, basically. With TBI of that degree, it is usually due to a strong blow to the head. They will have suffered subdural hematomae. They will likely have encephalomalacia – parts of the brain that were bruised in the TBI, and have subsequently died.

        Reconnecting the autonomic nervous system would be a great thing, but the patients ought

      • I'm frightened that they'll turn comatose/brain-dead people into locked-in [wikipedia.org] people. I consider the latter a fate worse than death.

        I was thinking something similar. What exactly happens if they get this person 10% functioning again?

        I am going to have gaddamned nightmares about this!

        I wonder what the "screening" is going to be? Familes deciding they want to take the chance that they might send their dearly departed into a world of non-concious screaming pain and agony? The locked in example? Horrors!

        Ethics? Was Josef Mengele on the ethics committee?

      • Is euthanasia legal for someone previously declared dead or are they now forced to keep this half alive person alive?

        I suspect the expectation is that they will not get as close as that, and that they will cross that bridge when they come to it. The thinking probably goes along lines like "these people are already dead, so we can try this out and dispose of them afterwards".

        What if they regain their brain but not their memory (see the book Worthing Saga). Is this a desirable outcome where you have an adult with the brain of an infant that now has to relearn everything? Even if it's 100% and they can eventually return to normal intelligence, you now have 10+ years of learning to walk, read, write, and all the other things we learn in childhood. I'm not even sure that is a desirable outcome.

        This is probably not what they are trying to achieve - it would certainly be meaningless. There is very little reason to expect the person thus revived to be the person that had died - it would most likely be a new person in a mature or old body; it wo

  • Question (Score:5, Funny)

    by rlp ( 11898 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @01:56PM (#52037861)

    Division of Umbrella Corp? Just asking ...

  • Here's a new idea for a plot: person being experimented-on can't move or respond but feels and hears everything. Agony, hopelessness, and desperation as research staff leaves the TV on reruns of old shows for decades. By the time they fully revive him, he's gone mad and they give up. The Diving Bell and the Metamorphosis.

  • Paging Herbert West, Herbert West, please come to the blue phone!

  • If their eyes turn blue, you should probably burn them.

  • "to recruit 20 patients who have been declared clinically dead from a traumatic brain injury"

    I'm really interested to hear how you can recruit someone who is clinically dead. Or is it just the editors who are brain-dead?

  • The current zombie epidemic was caused by BioTek when they tried to reanimate the dead. (citation needed)

  • How did this pass congress? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Tuesday May 03, 2016 @02:25PM (#52038135)

    I mean, aren't they afraid of the competition?

  • So, here are our next 20 congressmen.

  • Within a week I'll be seeing this on some politically-skewed news site given as proof that brain death is just something doctors invented as an excuse to kill people. A week later, Obama will have invented it.

    • "Brain Death" is "Death". If a person's autonomic nervous system cannot support the life (respiration, digestion, heartbeat, etc.), then the organism is clinically dead.

      That said, there are people who are awake and aware, and depend on life-support to be "alive" and functioning.

      EXAMPLE: Polio victims. They live in chambers that do their breathing for them. They are otherwise awake and aware. I would not call them "dead", as some have been interviewed – from the big chamber that breathes for them.

      • You underestimate the power of politically-driven stupidity. In this case of the right-wing flavor, but the left are not much better. Here's an example:

        Politically biased news example: http://onenewsnow.com/pro-life... [onenewsnow.com]

        A child experiences a medical emergency, things go south, he is left brain dead. The hospital urges disconnection of life support, but the parents remain in understandable denial - can't really blame them for that. They are soon aided by a pro-life pressure group, the PJI. The group then uses

  • Full stop. If they "regrow" something it will be 100% a new person, most probably limited to basic baby like reaction. Now if they had spoken of persistent vegetative state that would be something else. But assuming a correct diagnose then brain dead == corpse with a beating heart maintained by machines.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sjames ( 1099 )

      Unless they get the diagnosis wrong...

  • At least the recruiter doesn't need to have any social skills!
  • Yeah, death sucks and usually makes the survivors feel shitty for a while, but it's all part of life. I can understand trying to cure a disease that leads to a long and painful demise, but why try to bring the dead back to life? They've already gone through the hard part. I'd personally be pissed if I died, then found out I had to do it all over again at a later date. Also, if we 'cure' brain death, we'll no longer have an ethical way to harvest organs for donation. The loss of a single person often leads t

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by sjames ( 1099 )

      The end goal is not re-animating the dead. The goal is regenerative medicine for the still living who have severe brain damage. They're just experimenting on the dead first for ethical reasons.

  • Good old Jean-Claude van Ramme.

  • So, suppose this works and a patient is revived to the point they are no longer brain dead. Will they be declared living? Will BioQuark assume responsibility for their care? Or, being legally dead, can BioQuark terminate them when they are done?

  • We are the Borg... ehm.. I mean BioQuark
  • Great song from Sepultura.

  • Recruiter: "So Mr ... ah .. Smith. My final question for you is the important one. As for the previous questions, your silence will be interpreted as consent. So, Mr. Smith would you like to be part of our study? '

    Brain Dead Person (Mr. Smith):

    Recruiter: "Excellent! Welcome aboard, great to have you on the team. Our people will draft up the paperwork and we'll get right to work. Thank you for your cooperation."

  • I can't escape the feeling that anyone brought back in this manner would be living in vain.

    Maybe NASA would have a use for them...

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