International
A recent startup company, Tomorrow.Bio, has opened and secured its place as Europe’s first human cryogenics lab.
The German company promises to preserve clients’ bodies and provide hope that future generations can revive them for the steep price of $200,000 (around the price of a brand new Lamborghini). The lab claims to have already frozen three to four people with hundreds more signed up and plans to expand to the United States.
When alerted that a client is in their last days, employees will position one of Tomorrow.Bio’s three retrofitted ambulances nearby to collect the body when they pass. The cryogenics process begins in the car on the way back to the lab.
“Once you go under zero degrees, you don’t want to freeze the body, you want to cryopreserve it. Otherwise, you would have ice crystals everywhere, and the tissue would get destroyed,” Emil Kendziorra, former cancer researcher and Tomorrow.Bio’s co-founder, told BBC. “To counteract that, you replace all the water, everything that could freeze in the body, with the cryoprotective agent.”
Other specialists in related fields have pushed back. A professor of neuroscience at King’s College, London, Clive Coen called out the company, saying that their practice is based on “a misplaced faith in antifreeze and a misunderstanding of the nature of biology, physics, and death.”
Kendziorra acknowledges that he does not know how high the probability of future revival using his methods is, but he is “pretty confident in saying the probability is higher than cremation, if nothing else.”
National
On Wednesday, the world’s most active volcano (located in Kīlauea, Hawaii) began erupting for the fifth time since December.
The United States Geological Survey posted on their Instagram that “small lava dome fountains in the north vent are feeding short lava flows,” and “volcanic gas emissions are elevated compared to during the eruptive pause.”
The organization reported that visible lava flow started at 2:59 p.m. and earthquake activity increased at 3:00 p.m.
Their official advisory report, reported volcanic gas, Pele’s hair, and other hazards:
“Other significant hazards also remain around Kīlauea caldera from Halemaʻumaʻu crater wall instability, ground cracking, and rockfalls that can be enhanced by earthquakes within the area closed to the public. This underscores the extremely hazardous nature of Kīlauea’s caldera rim surrounding Halemaʻumaʻu crater, an area that has been closed to the public since late 2007.”
Another report confirmed that the eruption concluded at 4:30 a.m. on Thursday.
The eruption can be viewed by rewinding the USGS livestream here.
Local
The Oklahoma City Zoo has announced a new member of their Cat Forest habitat: Pando, a seven month old Bobcat kitten found in a California-based rescue operation.
Zoo officials told the public that while it is not uncommon for rescued animals to be reintroduced into the wild, Pando’s relationship with people made release a poor choice for her.
“Unfortunately, Pando was not considered an appropriate candidate for reintroduction due to her strong interest in people.” Tyler Boyd, OKC Zoo’s Curator of Carnivores, said. “However, our hope is that this will make her an excellent participant in her own healthcare and wellbeing while at the Oklahoma City Zoo as she works with the caretaker team to learn new training behaviors.”
Pando was examined in the Zoo’s Joan Kirkpatrick Animal Hospital on January 17 and has since been added to the Cat Forest habitat where visitors can see her now.
“I’m very excited to welcome Pando into our animal family to inspire and inform our visitors about a very skilled and adaptable predator that is found in our own backyards here in Oklahoma,” Boyd said. “Bobcats play a vital role in controlling pest populations in the ecosystem, they are incredibly adaptable to changes in climate and environment, and they are extremely intelligent.”
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