"LIFE" AFTER DEATH.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15234, 22 February 1913, Page 2 (Supplement)

"LIFE" AFTER DEATH.

. , SURGERY MAHVELS.. - -"&&.?■■ Axexis Cabbed, of the Bockefeller Institute, New York, who won the, Nobel Prise last year for his researches into the preservation Jof living organs | apart from the body, has carried his experiments, a step further by maintaining all the normal functions of the heart, stomach, and other organs, -removed intact from a, cat's body, for 13 hours after death; A paper written-; by 'Dr. -:,' Carrel' direction, .describing his most : i-ecent experimented '■;; was read recent by' Professor j Pozzi to the French Academy of Medicine. Dr. Carrel removed in a single I mass the kidneys, heart, oesophagus (part of the alimentary canal). stomach, and intestines ox -an animal audi preserved them at the: normal temperature of the body. '' Into "the; severed trachea (windpipe)," said Professor V Pozzi,; "an indiarubber tube was inserted to enable artificial respiration to ;■ be inaintainod. 3 Them the 'organs of the thorax and abdomen, '■ vdth .-'•>. their : blood vessels, were'.'cat out-in ft single mass and placed in a vessel containing "■■:&', certain I solution at a temperature of 100 degrees .Fahrenheit. v; The hearfe continued to beat 1 slowly and regularly.-* After some minutes the blood pressure rose i and became eoraetimee almost i normal. ?? ■« The organs were then place in a box filled ; with the solution, protected '■ by a glass > plate. .The windpipe tube was fixed to an opening in ; the 4 side: of the box.;" Another; tube was i fixed to the oesophagus.\ It then became i possible /to inject water: or nourishment ! into the stomach. Placed in. a stove at : blood - the organs continued ! to live in an apparently normal state. . The pulsations of the heart, were strong and regular,, the circulation was normal." In one instance where tho: stomach was full of meat at the moment of death the process of normal digestion was carried on for some hours afterwards. Th© greater number Of the organs on which Dr. Carrel experimented continued in active life 10. 11, and even 13 hours after the death of the animal of which, they had formed part. •'■. i " A curious fact," added Professor Pozzi, "is that the blood of the < animal still circulating in the organs continued to take oxygen from the air and convert it into carbon dioxide (the ordinary process oi! breathing of living beings).