Zombie Dogs

In the last few seconds of Hugh Hewitt's radio show last night (listen live from 3pm - 6pm Pacific here or here), I thought I heard him say something like "zombie dogs," but since the end-of-the-show music was playing I couldn't be sure.

This morning I saw this headline on WorldNetDaily's Page 2 News: "Boffins Create Zombie Dogs." That answered the question of whether or not I heard Hugh right. I did. But it raised another question, besides the whole zombie thing.

What on earth is a "boffin?" It sounds too much like "buffoon," and what would they be doing creating zombie anythings? The word gives the impression that they might attempt creating zombies, but not that they'd succeed.

Naturally, I went to Dictionary.com and found this entry:

bof·fin also Bof·fin
( P ) Pronunciation Key (bfn)
n. Chiefly British Slang

A scientist, especially one engaged in research.

OK. That clears up one question, since the article was in an Aussie News site. Researchers--American researchers, not Boffins at all--created the zombie dogs.

Pittsburgh's Safar Centre for Resuscitation Research did the work. According to Nick Buchan of NEWS.com.au, these researchers "developed a technique in which subject's veins are drained of blood and filled with an ice-cold salt solution." It doesn't sound like the dogs are already dead when the procedure starts.

The animals are considered scientifically dead, as they stop breathing and have no heartbeat or brain activity. But three hours later, their blood is replaced and the zombie dogs are brought back to life with an electric shock.

So far, so good, I suppose. But why? This isn't like cloning your favorite pet, so you can have that lovable personality for two dog-lifetimes. If the dog is dying of cancer, for example, zombifying it won't help when you bring it back to life. It'll still have cancer.

This all sounds too much like Frankenweenie. But wait! There's more!

Plans to test the technique on humans should be realised within a year, according to the Safar Centre.

Who would volunteer to be a research subject for this???

Actually, it's not as bad as it sounds. For somebody else, of course.

However rather than sending people to sleep for years, then bringing them back to life to benefit from medical advances, the boffins would be happy to keep people in this state for just a few hours.

But even this should be enough to save lives such as battlefield casualties and victims of stabbings or gunshot wounds, who have suffered huge blood loss.

During the procedure blood is replaced with saline solution at a few degrees above zero. The dogs' body temperature drops to only 7C, compared with the usual 37C, inducing a state of hypothermia before death.

Although the animals are clinically dead, their tissues and organs are perfectly preserved.
Damaged blood vessels and tissues can then be repaired via surgery. The dogs are brought back to life by returning the blood to their bodies, giving them 100 per cent oxygen and applying electric shocks to restart their hearts.

Tests show they are perfectly normal, with no brain damage.

My little dog, Abby, isn't all that bright, so if they were using test subjects like her, I'm not sure how they'd know if there was any brain damage. I think I'd want this thing to be tested on smarter animals first before graduating to humans.

And, if there is damage to the blood vessels, won't the saline solution leak out the same places that the blood did, causing saline solution to go into places it's not supposed to be, like inside the abdominal cavity? Will the dogs survive a ten-hour heart transplant operation? Can the researchers still revive the dogs after a week? A month?

There are so many questions still to answer. I hope they do a lot more testing on animals with a variety of problems before they turn their attention to people.