Free Republic

A pig’s brain has been brought back to life, with functioning activity, nearly an hour after the animal had died. The eerie experiment aims to figure out how doctors can restore brain function to a patient who has suffered a sudden cardiac arrest. Sudden cardiac arrest stops blood flow from reaching the brain, which can cause serious, irreparable damage within minutes. This is why the resuscitation window for a cardiac arrest is so short.

The researchers found their watery prize while drilling sediment core samples out of the underwater limestone deposits that make up the Maldives archipelago in South Asia. After hauling each core onto their research vessel, the team sliced up the rock like a tube of cookie dough and put the pieces into a hydraulic press that squeezed any remnant moisture out of the pores. When the researchers tested the composition of these fresh-pressed water samples aboard their ship, they were surprised to find that the water was extremely salty — far saltier than the Indian Ocean is today. They did more...