Mike Darwin
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Michael G. ("Mike") Darwin, real name Michael Federowicz, (born 1955) was the president of the cryonics organization Alcor Life Extension Foundation from 1983 to 1988, and Research Director until 1992. He was also President of BioPreservation, Inc., and Director of Research of Twenty-First Century Medicine (a cryobiological/critical care medicine research company) from 1993 to 1999. At the time he resigned from Alcor in 1992, Alcor President Carlos Mondragon said Darwin had the most experience doing cryonics than "anyone else on the planet."[1] He is noted for his technical acumen and exceptional communication skills.[2]
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[edit] Personal background
Born in Indianapolis, Indiana, his interest in evolution and rejection of creationism earned him the nickname "Darwin" among his schoolmates.[2] Michael had a fascination with cryopreserving organisms as a young child.[3] In 1968, at the age of 12, he qualified for the Indiana state science fair with his project "Suspended Animation in Animals and Plants." He dreamed of becoming an astronaut and applying his research to space travel. His registration was lost and his project never judged, but he was given an honorable mention out of a sense of fair play. At the fair, however, he learned that a Dr. James Bedford had been frozen in California. This was the beginning of Darwin's lifelong interest in cryonics.
Federowicz contacted the Cryonics Society of New York (CSNY) and was sent a considerable amount of literature by Saul Kent, who became a lifelong patron of Michael's rapidly growing cryonics technical skills.[3] At the age of 17 Michael was invited by Saul Kent to cryopreserve a cryonics patient for CSNY. In his parents' Indiana living room, the teenager had independently built his own cryonics equipment, which he found on his New York visit to be more sophisticated than that CSNY had actually used for cryopreservation.[3] When he began his career as a dialysis technician, Michael adopted "Darwin" as his surname for his cryonics persona, so as not to endanger his career by the association with cryonics.
Darwin and Stephen Bridge co-founded the Institute for Advanced Biological Studies (IABS) in Indianapolis in 1977, which merged with the then-California-based Alcor Life Extension Foundation in 1982. Darwin served as the President of Alcor, and then as the Research Director from 1988 to 1992, leaving Alcor in 1992.[2] About 50 former Alcor members joined in the founding of the CryoCare Foundation, an organization dedicated to cryonics which later went defunct.[2] Darwin founded a company, BioPreservation, which contracted perfusion and transport services to CryoCare.[2]
Darwin is a vegetarian.[3] His dog Mitzi is preserved at Alcor.[4]
[edit] Technical accomplishments
Darwin was the first full-time cryonics researcher, for one year for Alcor in the 1970s.[2] Darwin worked alongside UCLA cardiothoracic researcher Jerry Leaf during the 1980s, and physician Dr. Steven B. Harris in the 1990s to create many of the key technologies and practices of modern cryonics. He has also made notable contributions to mainstream medical research, such as the use of liquid fluorocarbon ventilation for accelerated cooling of the human body.[1] Darwin and Harris were able to resuscitate dogs without neurological damage following 17 minutes of warm ischemia (clinical death at normal body temperature).
Although his only formal training was as a dialysis technician, he is a self-taught expert in the field of cerebral ischemia,[2] and a respected contributor to CCM-L, the international critical care medicine internet discussion group. In 2005, he was an invited co-author of a medical ethics article on the definition of death in the journal Critical Care.[3]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Mondragon, Carlos (1992). "Suspension Capability". Cryonics (Alcor Life Extension Foundation). http://www.cryonics.org/immortalist/november08/History.pdf. Retrieved 2009-08-26.
- ^ a b c d e f Best, Ben (2008). "A History of Cryonics". The Immortalist. Cryonics Institute. http://www.cryonics.org/immortalist/november08/History.pdf. Retrieved 2009-08-24.
- ^ a b c d Regis, Ed (1991). Great Mambo Chicken And The Transhuman Condition: Science Slightly Over The Edge. Westview Press. pp. 102–103. ISBN 0201567512.
- ^ Kunen, James S. (July 17, 1989). "Reruns Will Keep Sitcom Writer Dick Clair on Ice—indefinitely". People Magazine. http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20120770,00.html. Retrieved 2009-08-24.
