X-Message-Number: 2036
Date: Sun, 28 Mar 93 17:45:47 -0800
From: 
Subject: CRYONICS  Trans Time newsletter


THE TRANS TIMES
Life Extension through Cryonic Suspension
 
Volume 2 Number 1                                 February 1993
 
 
               Gibraltar Building Status Report
 
                       By Carmen Brewer
           TRANS TIME director and property manager 
 
I thought it was about time to give a report on the building
located at 165 Gibraltar Court in Sunnyvale CA that TRANS TIME
and some members of the American Cryonics Society bought about
nine months ago. The first five or six months were very
difficult and we feared that we might not be able to hold on to
the building, as some of the owners seemed unable to come up
with their share of the monthly expenses, such as mortgage
payments, utilities and many repairs. 
 
It was a great disappointment to realize that it would be
difficult if not impossible to lease the building to other
tenants if cryonics patients were to be stored there; people
were reluctant to have their business in the same building with
a cryonics operation. We had hoped to make this lovely building
in a 2.2 acre park-like ground a home for cryonics, a home
where we could hold meetings and bring visitors, where clients
would be proud to visit and would feel good about being stored
in this pleasant location.
 
Between the difficulties of leasing part of this large building
to help with the enormous expenses, and the problems some of
the owners had in cooperating with each other, it soon became
apparent that it would be impossible to go on with the dream of
making this lovely building into a home for cryonics.
 
But that is the past; let us move on now to January 1993. We
have rented both the first and third floor for a total of
$7,500 per month which takes care of our loan payment plus some
of the expenses. Just recently we signed a short term lease for
some space on the second floor for storage only, at $900 per
month. 
 
We are actively offering the building for sale and/or lease. We
are having some interest lately, and it is my hope that we can
sell the building very soon so all the investors get their
money back with maybe a small profit. It was an adventure that
unfortunately did not turn out the way we had hoped, but we
certainly have learned a lot and we will be more careful in the
future. Let's not forget and even be proud that some of us
cryonicists tried bravely against great odds to buy a beautiful
new $1,250,000 home for our company, clients and patients.
 
We hope to sell this building very soon so that TRANS TIME can
move on to find a new home. One possibility is that TRANS TIME
can move to Berkeley and share with BioTime the building that
it currently occupies. We could cooperate with them in building
a state-of-the-art laboratory and operating room, and we would
greatly benefit from always having the research and suspension
team on hand. 
 
 
                        Research Update
 
                    by Hal Sternberg, Ph.D.
 
Our small animal research continues to provide clues to
improved cryonic suspension procedures.
 
Several recent experiments using the BioTime Cryogenic solution
confirmed previous studies that slow freezing and dehydration
is necessary to protect the circulatory system and reduce
vascular damage. Additionally, a series of other experiments
confirmed that slow perfusion is superior to fast perfusion
with respect to the degree of dehydration obtained using the
Cryogenic solution. These experiments suggest that flow rates
in the perfusion of humans should be restricted.
 
A hamster was perfused with increasing concentrations of the
BioTime Cryogenic solution. The hamster was frozen for two
days, including overnight at -20 degrees C. The animal was
thawed slowly and reperfused with blood. A photo of the
reperfused hamster brain is included. The brain is its normal
whitish color. The circulatory system appears to be intact, and
is not leaking blood. This contrasts with the glycerol-
preserved brain: in the upper hemisphere, the blood vessels are
destroyed or closed, while in the lower half they are leaking.
 
Studies are currently underway to improve the Cryogenic
solution and protocol further. We are testing new additives and
freezing/thawing regimens. In these experiments, hamsters are
submerged in a cooling bath whose temperature is computer-
regulated to hold temperature to within 0.1 degrees C. TRANS
TIME Director Stephen Kehrer wrote a program to control the
freezing rate. The cooling bath temperature can be varied with
time; thus animals can be frozen at desired rates and
maintained at desired temperatures. Studies are underway to
determine optimum conditions.
 
Electronics engineer Tom Umble continues to make progress on
the construction of a diathermy device. Tom has built the
device into the casing of a standard microwave oven. It can use
0 to 3000 watts of power and generate a wide range of radio
wave frequencies. The energy can be pulsed and amplitudes
modulated. Theoretically this may allow more uniform and rapid
warming. We will study optimum thawing procedures upon
completion of its construction.
 
 
[PHOTO OMITTED]
 
Reperfused hamster brain after cryoprotection with BioTime
Cryogenic solution and freezing to -20 degrees C.
 
 
[PHOTO OMITTED]
 
Reperfused hamster brain after cryoprotection with 3.6 molar
glycerol solution and freezing to -20  degrees C.
 
[AQ NOTE: Since the above was written, Hal has perfused hamsters 
with glycerol solutions, in which the brain afterward looked as 
good as with the BioTime solution.  To date, the reproducibility
using glycerol solutions has not been as good as with using
BioTime solution.]
 
 
                     The Funding Problem: 
                  Neural Nets to the Rescue? 
 
               by Peter H. Christiansen, M.Div.
 
In the December 1992 TRANS TIMES, Art Quaife discusses funding
requirements for long term cryostasis and concludes, quite
correctly in my view, that in the long run equity investments
are superior to so-called "conservative" investments such as
Treasuries, CDs, etc.
 
Meanwhile, the December 14 issue of Barron's featured an
article by a professional money manager reporting that Neural
Network Programs are now in the process of revolutionizing
investment management and that means equity investments will
soon become even better.
 
A neural net is a parallel-processing system that can be run as
a simple software add-on alongside a PC-based spreadsheet to
extract meaning from fuzzy or unclear data. Neural Network
Programs appear to mimic the way the human brain works in
generalizing from experience, although they often find patterns
in murky and complex fogs of information that humans are unable
to decipher. While the design of these networks is fairly
simple, the behavior they become capable of after having been
trained is sometimes quite surprising. Their workings appear to
resemble what Bucky Fuller called "intuition."
 
A few examples:
 
ASCI of Los Angeles has "trained" a neural net to detect
submarines with 95% accuracy.
 
The North American Radar Air Defense system is using a neural
net to determine if objects in the sky are threatening or non-
threatening like birds.
 
Mortgage lenders are using neural nets to mimic the decision-
making process of human loan officers. The trained nets far
surpass any human loan officers in making profitable loans and
in refusing bad loans.
 
Insurance companies are using neural nets to mine their vast
information banks for all sorts of "hidden meanings."
 
A professor at Stanford has used a neural net to forecast the
weather locally (rain/no rain) with almost perfect success.
 
And neural nets are being used on Wall Street, although
somewhat clandestinely. In the December Barron's, Avner
Mandelman, President of Cereus Investments in Los Altos Hills
CA publicly acknowledges that he has been using nets, built on
fundamental analysis, for six years. One of these nets
correctly called the 1987 "crash" two months before it
occurred. 
 
A net to which Mr. Mandelman fed large chunks of market-
valuation data and combinations of such data, alongside the
interest rate environment, distilled patterns and compared
these patterns to the market rise a year ahead. The net arrived
at some "understandings" and began to make forecasts.
Interestingly the net's ability to forecast during times of
"normal" activity is not particularly remarkable. But the
ability of the net to forecast extremesDmarket tops and market
bottomsDhas been extremely good. And of course it is knowing
the extremes, when to buy aggressively and when to sell short,
that is critical in any successful equity investment strategy. 
 
Of further interest is Mr. Mandelman's, or rather Mr.
Mandelman's net's chart, for the coming year. It indicates that
the Dow will reach 4000 and the S&P 500 will reach 550 by
November 1993!
 
For those who want to check all this out for themselves and
create their own neural net, Mr. Mandelman recommends Braincel,
by Promised Land Technology of New Haven Conn. This is a $250
program that runs alongside the Excel spreadsheet with Windows.
The same company also offers a more elaborate package called
Futuresbuilder for $1000.
 
NeuralWare of Pittsburgh is the Rolls-Royce of neural nets and
starts at $1895. 
 
And may the force be with you.
 
 
                Upgrading Surgical Preparedness
 
                     by Art Quaife, Ph.D.
 
Shawn Shermer is the Facility Supervisor in the laboratory of
the principal surgeon we use for cryonic suspensions. Last
March, she acted as assistant surgeon in the suspension of one
of our patients. At that time, TRANS TIME also hired her to
help with upgrading our response capability. Since then, she
has checked our inventory of surgical instruments and supplies,
prepared lists of equipment and supplies for us to purchase,
and suggested suppliers. We have now obtained virtually
everything she recommended. 
 
We bought a new aspirator pump to use as a cardiotomy sucker.
We bought a long list of surgical instruments, sutures, and
disposable supplies. We had three more oxygenator~tubing pack
combinations assembled and sterilized. We obtained the
electrodes to make our Bovie electrocautery unit again
functional. And we bought coverall suits and gloves to be worn
by personnel if we suspend patients with contagious diseases,
such as AIDS.
 
With the help of her friend Richard Wirth, Shawn made our
ethylene oxide gas sterilizer operational. We now sterilize all
of our instruments and supplies in-house.
 
Many thanks, Shawn.
 
[PHOTO OMITTED]
 
Shawn Shermer wraps supplies to be sterilized.
 
 
                       Upcoming Meeting
                               
TRANS TIME holds bimonthly business meetings at which visitors
are welcome. The next meeting will be the Annual Meeting of
Shareholders, held on Sunday, April 25, 1:00 p.m at:
 
                The Trans Time Facility
                10208 Pearmain Street
                Oakland, CA 94603
                510-639-1955.

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