This device can reactivate dead brains: Is it creepy or cool?

Scientists at Yale University have developed a device that can restore circulation and cellular activity in a pig’s brain four hours after death, raising ethical questions about the possibilities of one day applying it to humans.

BrainEx is an open-source device originally based on CaVESWave, a system developed by Biomed Innovations of North Carolina to preserve donated organs for research or transplantation.

The scientists perfused the pig’s brain with a specially designed chemical solution to restore circulation and cellular activity, challenging long-held assumptions about the timing and irreversible nature of the cessation of some brain functions after death. Their study was published April 17 in the journal Nature, and a detailed report on their work appeared July 2 in the New York Times Magazine.

The Times article described BrainEx as “roughly eight feet wide and mounted on the shelves of a long metal hospital-style cart… less a single machine than a bristling collection of individual machines, each connected to the next, in a simulacrum of the human body.” A pulse generator mimics the heart, filters work as mechanical kidneys. Another portion works like lungs to add oxygen to the perfusate.

The research, funded primarily by the National Institutes of Health Brain Initiative, has raised ethical concerns about the possibilities for future studies — including those on the human brain.

The Yale scientists said they harbor no such plans, and have not published photos or exact descriptions of the BrainEx device. They also stressed that the treated brain lacked any recognizable global electrical signals associated with normal brain function.

“The intact brain of a large mammal retains a previously underappreciated capacity for restoration of circulation and certain molecular and cellular activities multiple hours after circulatory arrest,” senior author Nenad Sestan, professor of neuroscience, comparative medicine, genetics, and psychiatry, said in a Yale news release.

“At no point did we observe the kind of organized electrical activity associated with perception, awareness, or consciousness,” added co-first author Zvonimir Vrselja, an associate research scientist in neuroscience. “Clinically defined, this is not a living brain, but it is a cellularly active brain.”

The researchers never aimed to restore consciousness to a brain, according to co-author Stephen Latham, director of Yale’s Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics.

“The researchers were prepared to intervene with the use of anesthetics and temperature-reduction to stop organized global electrical activity if it were to emerge,” Latham said. “Everyone agreed in advance that experiments involving revived global activity couldn’t go forward without clear ethical standards and institutional oversight mechanisms.”

The researchers said that it is unclear whether this approach can be applied to a recently deceased human brain. The chemical solution used lacks many of the components natively found in human blood, such as the immune system and other blood cells, which makes the experimental system significantly different from normal living conditions. However, the researchers stressed any future study involving human tissue or possible revival of global electrical activity in postmortem animal tissue should be done under strict ethical oversight.

The Yale researchers’ work prompted Stanford University law professor Hank Greely, Duke University legal scholar and ethicist Nita Farahany and Duke scientist Charles Giattino to write an essay for Nature that accompanied Sestan’s findings.

“New guidelines are needed for studies involving the preservation or restoration of whole brains, because animals used for such research could end up in a gray area — not alive, but not completely dead,” they wrote. “We’re reminded of a line from the 1987 film ‘The Princess Bride’: ‘There’s a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive.’ ”

On a more positive note, the new system could help studies into the roots of brain disorders, as well as neuronal connectivity in both healthy and abnormal conditions. It could even help doctors find ways to help salvage brain function in stroke patients or test the efficacy of novel therapies targeting cellular recovery after injury, according to the researchers.

“Previously, we have only been able to study cells in the large mammalian brain under static or largely two-dimensional conditions utilizing small tissue samples outside of their native environment,” said co-first author Stefano G. Daniele, an M.D./Ph.D. candidate. “For the first time, we are able to investigate the large brain in three dimensions, which increases our ability to study complex cellular interactions and connectivity.”

“This line of research holds hope for advancing understanding and treatment of brain disorders and could lead to a whole new way of studying the postmortem human brain,” added Andrea Beckel-Mitchener, chief of functional neurogenomics at the NIH’s National Institute of Mental Health, which co-funded the research.

There is an ethical imperative to use tools developed by the Brain Initiative to unravel mysteries of brain injuries and disease, said Christine Grady, chief of the Department of Bioethics at the NIH Clinical Center.

“It’s also our duty to work with researchers to thoughtfully and proactively navigate any potential ethical issues they may encounter as they open new frontiers in brain science,” she said.

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“It’s also our duty to work with researchers to thoughtfully and proactively navigate any potential ethical issues they may encounter as they open new frontiers in brain science,” she said.

These excerpts from the article - the first from mid-article and the last two paragraphs - indicate that the researchers concerns are mostly about the public relations “optics” surrounding the disclosure of their research, not any actual underlying moral dilemmas.

Bioethics and its supposed “experts” have yet to stop any important line of scientific or engineering research. That’s not their job. There job it to provide a check in the “due diligence” box when some annoying group of outsiders begin raising moral or religious objections to a particular line of scientific enquiry.

This, of course, is primarily a Western concern. In Russia and China, there are already medical researchers who have created (or are prepared to create) human babies that have been gene edited to have desired biological features for research purposes. While “harshly criticized” (in the case of the Chinese researcher), I have yet to read that he has been removed, jailed, charged, or punished in any effective way for his breach of the “bright line.” Even there, other than concerned talk at conferences, etc., it appears nothing is being done because it is all just intended to placate the old fashioned moral concerns of the ignorant and excitable masses.

But how does reviving a recently dead pig brain tie into gene editing babies? Human cloning. If you are going to clone a specific person, why not gene edit the clone to eliminate any gene-based disease or physiological limitations in the donor. Having perfected the body, it is now the ideal recepient for a transplanted head (cue the Italian doctor currently working this angle) or a brain directly. And, of course, doing that requires working out all the neurological angles of which, coincidentally, the research under discussion in the article constitutes the beginning

Of course, these are aged brains, so transplantation is only be an interim step until direct transfer of the brain’s contents into a new fresh brain could be perfected. Research into brain to computer interfaces is already underway. But such a transfer implies getting the organic brain to an appropriate level of development in order for it to receive the contents of an adult brain. So it may be necessary to research forced rapid physiological development. That could be masked as limb replacement research.

Or maybe not. The billionaire tycoons of Silicone Valley are also keenly pursuing research supporting download of human consciousness (with theirs being the first) into silicone-based hosts. So our robot overlords may not arrive from the stars. They might be homegrown.

It is just a matter of time, money, and the support of really smart, dedicated researchers who have been repeatedly assured by the “experts” that their efforts are “ethical” (for whatever that word will mean at that point.) and will benefit all of humanity (or atleast that portion of humanity that can afford it).

But that is in the future. I’m hungry. Is there a good patch of green succulent grass around here. Ahh. ZZzzzz.

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