This clause first appeared in Issue 1 of our novel free digital magazineCURIOUS .
With the looming scourge of a giant asteroid strike , Meryl Streep et al . jet off on a spaceship , their body cryonically frozen as they research for a new major planet to colonise , and inevitably destroy as they did the last . In case you have n’t see to it it , this is the ending to Netflix’sDon’t Look Up , the Oscar - nominated revelatory comedy free at the end of last year .
Of naturally , this is a work of science fabrication and here at IFLScience , we prefer to deal with scientific discipline fact . With that in mind , we require : Can humans actually pull through being immobilise ? Can we , like Meryl Streep , just defrost our 22,740 - year - chilled bodies and emerge on another satellite like nothing ever happened ( only to be savagely eaten by a dinosaur - alike animal seconds after ) ?
While the latter doubt is firmly in the realms of sci - fi – the solvent being a resounding no , definitely not – there are some examples of the human body surviving at pretty nippy temperatures .
In Minnesota in 1980 , one cleaning lady drop six hours in the nose candy after crashing her car and searching fruitlessly for help . doctor account she was “ wintry firm ” and compare her body to “ a piece of meat out of a bass freeze ” . And yet , somehow , with the help of some warming pads , she live to severalise the tale .
In a similarstory from 2016 , a 25 - year - old man did a 12 - time of day stint in the snowfall at temperature of -20 ° C ( -4 ° F ) . Despite doctors being unable to detect a pulsing , they managed to “ bring him back to aliveness ” , minus a few digits lost to frostbite .
Sounds pretty impressive , right ? But did these mass really survive being frozen , as the newspaper headline claim ?
Can humans live on being freeze ?
“ The unretentive answer is no , it is not possible , and very probably never will be potential , ” Professor Gary Bryant , Associate Dean ( Physics ) at RMIT University , told IFLScience .
In fact , the human eubstance – normally maintained at 37 ° atomic number 6 ( 98.6 ° F ) – really ca n’t manage with much temperature alteration at all .
“ In general terms , damage will start to occur to the human body if the interior temperature change by more than a few degrees , ” Bryant added .
“ A fever of more than 40 ° C [ ° F ] is very dangerous , and hypothermia begin to fall out if the body temperature drops below 35 ° one C [ ° F ] . ”
And freezing , he tot , “ is a whole other issue . ”
“ There are no instance of people being brought back after being actually frozen . ”
Why then , are there these report of citizenry recovering from being freeze solid ? harmonise to Bryant , these are simply examples of people being take back from severe hypothermia . Arguably still pretty providential but not quite as death - defying as they initially seemed .
In medicine , there are some examples of downhearted temperatures being used to keep tissue damage – hump as healing hypothermia – but this happens at temperatures far above freezing .
“ Controlled cooling of people during surgery is something that has been done ( with cooling generally down to around 31 - 32 ° ampere-second [ ° F ] ) , ” read Bryant . “ But its use is specify ( and the benefit vs risks scrap ) . ”
In 2019 , a human was put into emergency saving and resuscitation ( EPR ) – what sci - fi buff might consult to as “ suspended animation ” – for the first time , essentially becoming a human tardigrade . The cognitive operation involves being pumped full of salty piddle to chill the genius to a cool 10 - 15 ° C ( 50 - 59 ° F ) , buy surgeons up to two hours to complete potentially life - lay aside operations .
But is cryonics , the scientifically dubitable wondering idea that human race can be put into humble - temperature repositing , preserved for future reanimation , the future ? No .
How do humans survive extremely low temperatures ?
To sympathise how humans survive at low temperature , we first need to understand just how low we ’re blab out .
In the instance of the 25 - year - old “ frozen ” in a Baron Snow of Leicester drift , “ the … internal eubstance temperature was unlikely to be below about 30 ° degree Celsius [ 86 ° F ] , ” Bryant tell apart IFLScience .
Reports say his temperature did n’t register on a digital thermometer , but , Bryant say , this does n’t stand for it was sub - freezing .
“ They were no doubt using a touchless ( infrared scanner ) these generally do not register temperature below about 34 ° C [ ° F ] . However , even if the cutis temperature is 30 ° C [ 86 ° F ] ( such as my fingers on a stale day ) , the inner body temperature will still be around 37 ° vitamin C [ 98.6 ° F ] . ”
As for how he survived , it seems he may have physics to give thanks , at least in part .
“ From a physics degree of view being trapped under the snow means that heat red ink is quite slow ( snow is a good insulator ) . Radiative losses would still occur , but over several hours these would only lower the consistence temperature by several degrees , ” Bryant tell .
“ None of the intimate full of life organ would have come nigh to being frozen , even if there was severe frostbite on the outer layers . ”
What happen in the trunk at these very dispirited temperatures to keep us alive ?
To answer that motion , we can look to nature . It ’s no secret that in the wintertime months , many brute retreat from the world and accede hibernation – often bulking up in preparation for the big sleep before ( fat bear , we ’re look at you ) . But what befall during this months - long reprieve is less well known .
To outlive at such cold temperatures , hibernating animals slow down ( but do n’t stop ) their metabolism – the operation that exchange atomic number 8 and intellectual nourishment into energy . For every degree Celsius drop in consistence temperature , metamorphosis drops by 5 to 7 percentage . With a slower metabolic pace , animals in hibernation require less oxygen at miserable temperatures and therefore retard their kernel rate and breathing . This conserves energy when insufficient intellectual nourishment is available .
In case of extreme hypothermia , human bodies do much the same .
While this can be living - saving , it is still incredibly serious – as we know , take a breath and having a heartbeat are essential when it come to being live . But , if someone suffering uttermost hypothermia is discovered before the essence check , then they stand a adept chance of making it .
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Why ca n’t humans outlive being frozen ?
In one word of honor : chicken feed .
Humans can not survive have any chicken feed in our body . And seeing as ice rink formation and freezing go hand in hand , it is quite the roadblock to go being frozen .
“ By the clock time the internal temperature gets to below 0 ° hundred [ 32 ° F ] , the insensate itself will have already shoot down many cellphone and variety meat , but once ice forms , it is basically going to be lethal to most cells , and therefore to the homo , ” Bryant told IFLScience .
Unfortunately for anyone wanting to produce a human ice lolly , the grownup human body is 60 pct water . pee is found in cellphone throughout the body : the brainiac and core are nearly three - quarters piss , the lungs are 83 percentage pee , and even our bones contain some . At extreme low temperature , the water in these cells can freeze . As the water supply freezes , it expands , which can cause the cells to tear . Lethal to both cell and human , as Bryant say .
Most cells in the human body , in fact most mammalian cells , can not survive being frozen . However , there are some exclusion to this rule : red blood cells , sperm cubicle , testis cells , stem cells , and some cell lines for malignant neoplastic disease research have all been , and are routinely , cryopreserved – the unconscious process by which cells or tissue are keep up at sub - zero temperatures .
What creature can survive being freeze ?
Where humans precipitate unforesightful , animals come into their own . It may not be common , but there are a duo of animal who , unlike us , can go being frozen .
tardigrade , for exemplar , are no stranger to stand in - zero temperatures . The microscopical beasties have develop , over hundreds of millions of year , to collect high levels of cryoprotectants – chemical substance that prevent cell or tissues from becoming damage when frozen – which enable them to pull round freeze .
Frogs , meanwhile , are known to be capable to last being frozen for several months . Wood Gaul are fill with natural antifreeze ( clams ) , which lour the freezing point of pee in their bodies and prevents ice formation . This permit them to survive extreme winter temperature as they freeze and thaw with the environment – they can freeze out up to 70 per centum of their body water system and survive .
Sadly for humans , the power to survive freezing wo n’t be making the leap ( anuran wordplay intend ) over to us . Even if we could direct ourselves to have cryoprotectants , we would n’t be able to stand them .
We ’re just going to have to snap out the thermal , wrap up in a blanket , and let the animate being kingdom ( and Meryl Streep ) have the win on this one .
CURIOUS magazineis a new digital magazine from IFLScience featuring interviews , expert , deep dives , fun facts , news , book excerpts , and much more . Issue 3 is out now .
