11. Freeze Me When I Die
Listener Elspeth wants to know if living creatures can be frozen, stored and then reanimated. Our curious duo get into the chilling science of cryonics
When you die, would you want to be frozen so that one day you might be brought back to life? Listener Elspeth wants to know if thatβs even possible. So Hannah and Dara embark on a quest to explore the chiling science of βcryobiologyβ: preserving living things at really low temperatures.
It turns out there are already thousands of people alive who were once suspended in antifreeze and stored in liquid nitrogen - when they were just a small clump of cells! Thereβs even a frog which can turn into a βfrogsicleβ for months on end. But re-animating full size humans is a challenge no one has solvedβ¦yet. Will some miraculous nanotechnology of a distant future solve the problem?
Contributors:
Professor JoΓ£o Pedro de MagalhΓ£es: University of Birmingham
Hayley Campbell: Author and broadcaster
Professor Joyce Harper: UCL
Dr Hanane Hadj-Moussa: The Babraham Institute, Cambridge
Garrett Smyth: Cryonics UK
Producer: Ilan Goodman
Executive Producer: Alexandra Feachem
A ΒιΆΉΤΌΕΔ Studios Audio Production
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