The first ever human head transplant could be achieved by the end of this decade. This is claimed by a former neurosurgeon who believes he knows how the feat of moving a person's consciousness into another body can be made to work.
bruce matthew, former clinical lead for neurosurgery at Hull University Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, was working on a science fiction novel with Institute of Futurology founder Michael Lee when he realized the potential key to making the wacky head transplant surgery a success.
First head transplant: bone marrow is also needed
Long story short, Mathew believes surgeons should not only transplant a person's head, but place the entire spinal cord into another body.
Until now, the few controversial scientists who strove to make head transplantation (when not brain transplants) a reality have focused primarily on methods that exclude the spinal cord. Head transplantation is an idea that Mathew, an experienced neurosurgeon with more than 10.000 operations performed, describes as "absolutely ridiculous".
But the 63-year-old Scot says that human advances in neurosurgery, robotics and stem cell transplants could make it possible to reconnect an entire spinal cord (and obviously the corresponding head) to another body before 2030. A real transplant in the head, in short.
“Initially our intention was to brainstorm an idea and it seemed pretty silly, but then I realized it's actually not. If you transplant the brain and keep the brain and spinal cord together, it's actually not impossible,He said Mathew to The Telegraph.
“The spinal cord is the most connected thing to an individual imaginable. We need to keep the brain connected to the spinal cord. The idea of separating it from the head in a transplant is absolutely ridiculous." I suppose that for this reason a brain transplant should be considered a completely senseless operation. Brain transplant and human head transplant are two totally different paths.
Head transplant: yesterday and today
Studies on brain transplantation start a long time ago. Robert J. White's mammoth work over the last century has shaped much of current research. The “father” of head transplant has published more than 900 articles on the topic of “monkey head transplant”.
Today, one of the scientists who has made headlines in the field of head transplantation is the Italian neurosurgeon sergio canavero. In 2017, the controversial Dr sergio canavero, a neurosurgeon, said he successfully performed a first head transplant on a cadaver, bypassing the spinal cord starting at the base of the neck.
Sergio Canavero's procedure received a lot of criticism from other scientists (and a small passage on the program “Le iene transplanta di testa edition”), who in addition to skepticism underlined his previous claim of success with a monkey, which did not never regained consciousness and would have been paralyzed if she had. A few years ago, in 2015, the TV show "Le Iene" also covered his case. For my part, I searched for "monkey head transplant" but I didn't find many sources around: I'll look better.
Canavero, who has a human volunteer on hold, suggested that his work on head transplants it could pave the way to immortality. And “immortality” is the concept also used in the title of Mathew and Lee's book, “Chrysalis”: a sort of surgical science fiction on the potential of some procedures.
But if we go from science fiction to reality, where are we with the head transplant?
“At the moment, you can connect one or two nerves, but with robotics and artificial intelligence we will soon be able to make 200 nerves. You would remove the entire spine, so you could drop the entire brain, spinal cord, and lumbar region into a new body. Obviously it is very difficult to extract the dura (the protective membrane of the spinal cord) without making a hole. It will take a series of incremental advances and steps, but head transplant will likely happen in the next 10 years. “
Any medical benefits
While the method would not be of any help to people with spinal injuries, it could help people with degenerative muscle diseases, and Mathew suggests that it could allow people to receive robotic bodies.
Mathew told The Telegraph that there are still questions about whether the head and spine could be made to successfully integrate with so much of another person's DNA. It may also be necessary to transfer its intestinal bacteria.
But he believes that stem cell transplants could be used to prevent rejection.
“By taking DNA from the brain and spinal cord, as well as a bone marrow donor. You would get rid of the donor's DNA and then colonize it with that of the person receiving the body.", he told the newspaper.
“I mean, there are huge problems for the first head transplant, but it's possible. There are thousands of people in hibernation, often just the heads. There are companies that truly believe they will one day awaken them from the dead, cure them of diseases and give them new bodies. What I'm proposing is quite conservative in comparison.".
