[Link] Persistence of Long-Term Memory in Vitrified and Revived C. elegans worms

Rangi

http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/rej.2014.1636

This is a paper published in 2014 by Natasha Vita-More and Daniel Barranco, both associated with the Alcor Research Center (ARC).

The abstract:

Can memory be retained after cryopreservation? Our research has attempted to answer this long-standing question by using the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans), a well-known model organism for biological research that has generated revolutionary findings but has not been tested for memory retention after cryopreservation. Our study’s goal was to test C. elegans’ memory recall after vitrification and reviving. Using a method of sensory imprinting in the young C. elegans we establish that learning acquired through olfactory cues shapes the animal’s behavior and the learning is retained at the adult stage after vitrification. Our research method included olfactory imprinting with the chemical benzaldehyde (C₆H₅CHO) for phase-sense olfactory imprinting at the L1 stage, the fast cooling SafeSpeed method for vitrification at the L2 stage, reviving, and a chemotaxis assay for testing memory retention of learning at the adult stage. Our results in testing memory retention after cryopreservation show that the mechanisms that regulate the odorant imprinting (a form of long-term memory) in C. elegans have not been modified by the process of vitrification or by slow freezing.

It seems that you are trying to argue that there is some sort of conspiracy by cryobiologists to prevent cryonicists from publishing in high-impact journals.

If I understand correctly, the Society for Cryobiology officially bans its members from practicing or endorsing cyonics (defined as the cryopreservation of human corpses for the purpose of reanimation), but it has no position about preventing people associated with cryonics organization from publishing research.

If you want to claim that cryobiologists are covertly suppressing research by cryonicists by lobbying journal editors or abusing the peer review system, I would say that this is a very serious accusation of professional misconduct and you should not make it unless you can back it with evidence.

some sort of conspiracy by cryobiologists to prevent cryonicists from publishing...the Society for Cryobiology officially bans its members from practicing or endorsing cyonics

Yes. Some sort of conspiracy. I don't know why anyone would think that. What an odd thing to think.

it has no position about preventing people associated with cryonics organization from publishing research.

'Comrades, good news. You are free to research and publish anything you want about capitalist economics, as long as it's negative and does not endorse or practice it. Let 100 flowers bloom!'

I would say that this is a very serious accusation of professional misconduct and you should not make it unless you can back it with evidence.

Are you arguing that despite bitter hatred and an astonishing policy outright banning cryonics, this has zero influence on the notoriously politicized, inconsistent, random, risk-averse scientific publication process which has been amply documented to settle for lowest common denominators, punish ambitious work, express peer reviewers' personal prejudices in discriminating against minorities, conservatives, etc? You think that somehow cryonics papers will be an exception to all this, will get a free pass and be fairly and impartially evaluated by its sworn enemies?

The ban is right there in the bylaws.

Again, the bylaws bans members of the Society for Cryobiology from practicing or endorsing cryonics, it does not mandate them to sabotage the publication of research by cryonicists. One thing does not necessarily imply the other.
The former is an unusual, perhaps controversial, but IMHO understandable rule that does not constitute professional impropriety, the latter would be a gross breach of scientific ethics. If you want to claim that cryobiologists are doing the latter anyway, then you need evidence.

just point out that any papers to do with cryonics are not going to be treated the same.

The paper is not about cryonics, is about cryopreservation of C. elegans, the only connections with cryonics are the authors' affiliation and the acknowledgment section, which would be not even visible to the referees if the journal used a double-blind review protocol.
Even assuming that the referees could guess from the content that the paper was coming from cryonicists, they would have to be extremely prejudiced to reject it out of hand without considering its scientific merits.

And anyway, in the review protocol of most reputable journals, the authors can petition to the editor to change the referees if they have a reasonable suspicion that they may be biased. Am I to believe that the Society for Cryobiology has so much influence on all the major journals that the editors couldn't find any unbiased referee?

Please see the citations about the many serious flaws which have been demonstrated in peer review. Bias is the default.

Said every crackpot on the Internet.
Peer review has many flaws, but the consistent suppression of correct but unpopular scientific theories by an interest group is not one of them, as far as we know.

Again, evidence please. If what you are saying is true, there should be tons of good scientific articles from cryonicists that were rejected with flimsy excuses. Cryonicists could make them public and scientists from contiguous sub-fields (e.g. neurobiologists, who often use cryopreservation techniques in their research) would notice. It would be a major scandal that would forever destroy the reputation of mainstream cryobiolgists. Cryonicists have in their interest the destruction of the reputation of their mortal enemies.
So why this does not happen? Maybe because this heap of unfairly rejected articles does not exist?

That they are biased is not in question.

Actually, it is in question. But even if you assume that their are biased, it doesn't follow that they are blacklisting cryonicists from publishing.

The difference is that things like anti-vaxers have been disproven time and again and often to be based on fraud or deception, and have no experimental evidence and are not simple extrapolations of current theories, whereas cryonics, while still unproven and highly speculative, is none of those.

Yes, because frauds never happened in cryonics.

There's a difference between proto and pseudo science.

Sure. I have a cold fusion reactor to sell you...

Again, the bylaws bans members of the Society for Cryobiology from practicing or endorsing cryonics, it does not mandate them to sabotage the publication of research by cryonicists. One thing does not necessarily imply the other.

Give me a break. When a professional society has declared something to be so beyond the pale that it will formally censure and expel any members who goes near it or says anything positive about it, there is going to be a chilling effect for anyone doing closely related research, and people have said as much privately.

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[Link] Persistence of Long-Term Memory in Vitrified and Revived C. elegans worms

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