Technical Procedures
The Cryonics Institute has always provided all initial procedures, transport and storage internally, without contracting out to other providers. For most of its history, CI perfused bodies with the (antifreeze) cryoprotectant glycerol, but in the year 2000 a cryobiologist was hired: Yuri Pichugin, Ph.D. who had done research on the Hippocampal Slice Cryopreservation Project (HSCP). HSCP was a project focused on vitrification of rat brain hippocampal slices which involved cooling to −130 degrees Celsius, rewarming and testing for viability. The results of the HSPC were published in the April 2006 issue of the journal Cryobiology.
At the Cryonics Institute, Pichugin developed a vitrification mixture which is superior to glycerol in preventing ice formation. This vitrification mixture was first applied to two dogs of members who wanted their pets cryopreserved in 2004 and early 2005. The first human client received the vitrification mixture in the summer of 2005 using a new procedure in which the head was vitrified while still attached to the body, which was frozen without any cryoprotectant. In February 2007 the Cryonics Institute abandoned its efforts to patent its vitrification mixture and disclosed the formula to preclude others from preventing its use by CI. Dr. Pichugin resigned from the Cryonics Institute in December 2007.
In the summer of 2005, the Cryonics Institute obtained some custom-built computer-controlled cooling boxes, with LabVIEW software which would allow controlled cooling to a temperature as low as −192°C (−313°F). This equipment was necessary for effective application of vitrification, because cooling should be as fast as possible prior to the solidification temperature of the vitrification mixture (about −125°C), but cooling should be very slow below that temperature to reduce cracking due to thermal stress.
Instead of using dewars for storage, the Cryonics Institute cryopreserves bodies in large fiberglass/resin liquid-nitrogen-filled "thermos bottles" which CI calls "cryostats". The first cryostats were hand-built in-house by Facilities Manager Andy Zawacki, but now the units are custom built by an external manufacturer. Costs for liquid nitrogen in the newest and most efficient cryostats was below $100 per human body per year in May 2006. Cost reduction is greatly assisted by the use of a 3,000 gallon bulk tank for liquid nitrogen, which is located behind the building. From this central point the liquid nitrogen gets distributed to the cryostats over a system of pipes.
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