Alcor at Work Photo Gallery:
Facility Equipment
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| MOBILE ADVANCED RESCUE CART (MARC): Alcor's Mobile Advanced Rescue
Cart (MARC) is deployed via our ambulance for use in local cases. The cart
was custom-fabricated from welded steel. A cardiopulmonary support device,
such as the LUCAS, is placed over the patient in an ice bath and driven
by two compressed-gas cylinders in the base of the cart. The cart also incorporates
a blood pump/oxygenator system for heart-lung bypass (when surgically possible).
The MARC enables uninterrupted blood circulation and rapid surface cooling
while the patient is being transported to our facility. |
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| MARC: The ice bath on the MARC contains a submersible pump which
is powered by batteries below. The two flexible blue tubes are placed over
a patient lying in the bath, and are perforated to distribute icewater as
effectively as possible across the skin. |
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| PERFUSION EQUIPMENT: In Alcor's operating room, this array of equipment
controls and monitors the process of cryoprotective perfusion. Four medical-grade
roller pumps in the base of the array allow precise control of pressure
and flow. Four refractometers (small, square units in the center) monitor
changes in cryoprotectant concentration. A computer displays and records
temperature, pressure, and concentration data. Tubing, filters, a heat exchanger,
and liquid reservoirs would be added during an actual case. |
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| PERFORATOR: Numerous medical instruments are used during surgical
preparation of cryonics patients. One of the instruments is a standard neurosurgical
tool called a perforator. It is specially designed to penetrate the skull
without harming the brain. The perforator is used during cryonics surgery
to make two small holes (one over each brain hemisphere) so that the surface
of the brain can be observed during cryoprotective perfusion. If the wall
of small brain blood vessels (blood brain barrier) becomes damaged by long
intervals of stopped blood circulation (ischemia), brain swelling (edema)
can occur during perfusion. Since edema is potentially destructive, it must
be carefully monitored. |
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| SUPERCOOL X-1000 ICE BLOCKER: Alcor's cryoprotectant solutions
incorporate state-of-the-art "ice blockers" to prevent ice formation during
vitrification. These ice blockers have been shown in published
studies to permit vitrification of larger volumes at slower cooling
rates than previously possible. |
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| COOLDOWN AREA: In the foreground at right, the whole body cooling bath is a large rectangular box whose thick walls contain three layers of Dow Trymer foam insulation. The purpose of this equipment is to reduce the temperature of
a wholebody patient after cryoprotective perfusion, by immersing the patient
in silicone oil cooled with dry ice. Two drums of oil are visible at the
bottom of this photo. After the bath has been partially filled, a patient
is wrapped in protective plastic and strapped to the wire-mesh stretcher,
which is lowered into the oil. An insulated lid is placed over the bath,
and a pump circulates the oil through a trough containing large pieces of
dry ice (frozen carbon dioxide) whose temperature is -79° Celsius. A
newer system (not shown) is able to cool wholebody patients using cold nitrogen
vapor to even lower temperatures for purposes of achieving vitrification.
Wholebody vitrification technology is still under development. |
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Behind the whole-body bath is the neuro cooldown area, where nitrogen
vapor is injected through a computer-controlled valve into a small Dewar
containing a neuropatient. In the background stands a tall Dewar which
is used to slowly cool a wholebody patient from -79° to -196°
(the temperature of liquid nitrogen).
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| NEURO COOLDOWN EQUIPMENT: A Dewar of liquid nitrogen (foreground)
is connected to a small neuropatient cooldown Dewar (background). A computer
control system maintains a pre-programmed temperature descent by periodically
injecting liquid nitrogen into the Dewar while a fan continuous stirs the
nitrogen gas. The computer also receives data from temperature sensors in
the patient. |
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| BIGFOOT DEWAR: Bigfoot Dewars are Alcor's primary patient care
system. Dewars are stainless steel vacuum-insulated containers that hold
liquid nitrogen (named after their inventor, Sir James Dewar, in 1885).
Alcor's Dewars are called "Bigfoot" because of the large casters at the
bottom. Each Bigfoot can hold four wholebody patients, or 10 neuropatients
in each space that would otherwise be occuppied by a whole body patient.
Patients are maintained at a steady temperature of -196° Celsius, immersed
under liquid nitrogen, with no need for electricity. Approximately 15 liters
of liquid nitrogen per day evaporates from a Bigfoot Dewar, which must be
periodically replenished. |
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