My current novel involves the need for human cryostasis due to extended space travel. At present, I'm simply referring to the process of waking up from a cryo state as, well, waking. I've been unable to find an acceptable term for this. I could use "defrost" but it doesn't really paint the picture I want. Have I maybe overlooked something? Is there a term or a word that best describes the reversal of cryostasis?
Has anyone ever experienced that IRL? I can't find anything. I'd imagine it would be like coming to consciousness after a major accident. At first you can hear a little, then more, then a sense of light, etc. Perhaps form your own slang conjunction to suit the people you're writing about? Wacon (conjunction of the first two syllables of Waking Consciousness)? Hm, interesting challenge. Come back and let us know what you decide.
Yea because no-one ever survived this... Coming to consciousness however might fit the idea of what could happen.
Thanks for the replies. This was what I'd meant when I used the term waking. So things like awake, awakening, waking up etc. I just felt it was a bit of an awkward way of describing it. It doesn't particularly fit a lot of scenarios. For example: Kira initiated the waking procedure. Kira initiated the awakening procedure. Kira initiated the process of waking up the... It just sounds awkward for the purpose it's being used for. This could work, particularly if I describe the cryostasis state as suspended animation. Thanks for the suggestion, it's definitely a little different/ This could actually be on the right track. I like the idea of using thermal, that could be just the thing I've been trying to think of. Thermal stimulation perhaps? No one has experienced it, as far as I'm aware. At least not like this. There are things like cryotherapy where you spend a small period of time within a purpose built room, but you're always conscious and it's more of a muscle recovery kind of thing. The real problem with cryosleep is the way cells within the body react to it. As soon as cells within the body reach below freezing point, ice begins to form between them. The ice dehydrates the cells and, as it grows, crushes the cells which is irreversible and causes death. Cryostasis is suppose to be the reversible form of crysleep in which specific gases are used within the body to form clathrate hydrates to prevent cells from dehydrating. Based on that, I'd assume there'd also be things like: - Feeling bloated or having excess water weight - A lowered sense of feeling to touch - The potential for temporary movement system impairment I do like the idea of forming my own unique slang to describe the process.
I was thinking about people who've experienced near-death experiences but yeah, that was a dumb statement.
I wonder how central nervous system cells would react to such an event. I know that during the process of dying from hypothermia the autonomic nervous system will rapidly dilate the major arteries and veins and increase both heart rate and blood pressure, resulting in a sensation of intense heat. Many hypothermia victims are found either stripped or with parkas, etc. removed and it's because of the rush of warmer blood to the torso and extremities. Do some research on people who've been resuscitated from near-death from hypothermia. Beck Weathers would be a good place to start. That's as close an experience as I can think of to what you want to describe.
I started to think about this and then I remember there a few different types of ice. It depends exclusively on how fast the object is frozen. At work, we use liquid nitrogen to freeze samples instantaneously. This is to create vitreous ice. Vitreous ice doesn't expand, so none of the microscopic cell is damaged in the process. It is also perfectly clear. So maybe if the subject was in a thin containment cell, which was flash frozen by LN2, you could freeze a person without damage. Maybe a cell within a cell that evenly plunges the inner cell into LN2. Then to maintain this cold temperature, the inner cell could be transferred to a room under vacuum. The vacuum would need to be 10 -8 or 9 Torr to maintain the temperature, and chilled with LN2 circulation or something of the like to -157 degrees c. Just some thoughts on plausibility. Vacuum would be necessary I think to prevent unwanted icing on the cells in the containment room. Still working out thawing.
Hm, how would the human body react in a vacuum? I'm thinking pressure differential here unless you meant a large container into which the body is placed prior to freezing. Even then, how would temperatures that low effect the movement of electrons between axon and intron, if at all? The autonomic nervous system has to be minimally functional to maintain the brain even if that body's cellular function is artificially slowed. Once again thinking about Beck Weathers. Interesting problem.
I'm thinking if they were extensively cleaned and held at center of a container with 99.9 percent or better distilled water, this may be possible. Holding cell layer must be extremely thin, and the subject would probably need to already be in an induced coma. Structure should be fine in a vacuum unless something acts on it, but then they are frozen in vitreous ice and it wouldn't matter anyways.
So the respiratory system must be flooded with 100% H2O. I know the Navy has experimented with liquid oxygen delivery to some extent but it would have to be a very good process to protect alveoli, etc. Those tissues are sensitive to pressure, temperature, all sorts of conditions.
Yeah, I think the most difficult concern is speed of freezing. Freeze to slow and the ice goes cubic, destroying everything.
Disclaimer: Mulling this over while still drinking my wake-up coffee. Tossing this scenario around the cranium I hit on the Z factor. When freezing a tissue sample the sample is usually a single cell layer thick so the change in thermal energy moves fast enough to prevent crystallization. An entire human body? That's a lot of cell layers to go through and the change in thermal energy would have to occur at all points, internal and external, to prevent crystallization. How to make that happen? Then there's the brain stem to consider. It must be functioning at some level to maintain heart rate, blood pressure, et cetera even if those activities are slowed to almost a standstill and the brain stem will actively work against the change in thermal energy (see Beck Weathers again, he likely woke when his brain stem flooded his body with relatively warm blood in a last ditch effort to save itself.) So one would have to have intricate understanding of the brain stem and how it functions in order to allow baseline function yet prevent things like sudden vessel dilation. We're nowhere near that level of understanding, not even regarding the cerebrum. Even under exceeding reduced metabolic requirements, metabolism must continue at some rate to allow the brain stem to function at all. ETA: and then there's the protein factor. Most proteins are sensitive to temperature. If somehow one was completely frozen, upon waking the proteins at the cellular level would be denatured. Instant death, that. This is why I wanted to be a biophysicist. <sigh>
Yeah, I was thinking a lot of the same things. LN2 is used because it is cheap, but I'm sure there are more expensive cold liquids that could do the same process. The other thing to consider is replacing the distilled water with something of a lower specific heat capacity. If the subject can be frozen fast enough, the proteins will survive intact, but as I said earlier, thawing is the second part that I don't even want to think about yet. Getting into the realm of science fantasy, the subject may need to die and be exsanguinated, be preserved in cryostasis via injecting liquid cold substance directly into the gaps (i.e. circulatory, respiratory, and digestive systems), and then stored in a cold room. Brain stem is more of an issue here, but maybe if everything else freezes fast it would be easier to get around. Thawing may have to be extremely slow to prevent cell rupture from uneven expansion. This is fun. Any volunteers?
Research Star Trek, there is literally loads of words such as, crystasis, stasis, cryogenic stasis and it goes on and on. Maybe watch an episode of star trek or a film. Kahn from star trek was into all that old fashioned cryogenic stuff. The film would be into darkness, you can find the specific clips your after on youtube. Interesting to note that due to the development of the warp core all the cryogenic stuff got fazed out.
You go right on ahead with that. ETA: This is what always ruined scifi for me. I'll be trucking along and then hit something like this scenario and my brain does a full-skid halt. "Wait a minute, what about. ...?" ETA2: Whatever that is, it has to contain oxygen in chemical bond weak enough to allow conversion that supports the Kreb cycle. IIRC and it's been a long time since chemistry, oxygen bonds can't exist at extremely low temperatures can it? And isn't there an issue with low gravity and those bonds?
Awww, you don't like being crushed into a space as small as a quark by the extreme gravity of a dark star? You're no fun...
