Italian Surgeon Seeks to Attempt Controversial Head Transplant in Two Years

An Italian surgeon plans to push the frontiers of transplantation surgery to its brink in two years by doing what everybody considers undoable, the human head transplant.

According to Sky News, the surgeon Sergio Canavero from Turin Advanced Neuromodulation Group has detailed his technique in the Surgical Neurology International. The technique relies on cooling the head and the donor body to extremely low temperatures in order to reduce oxygen requirement. The head is then transplanted onto the body and major blood vessels are connected with tubes. The key to success is fusing spinal cords with polyethelene glycol that helps fat within cells to fuse. The fused head and body are then allowed to heal by inducing a coma for four weeks to prevent movement.

CNET reported that Canavero's attempt isn't the first of its kind. Head transplantation was tried in the past on monkeys and dogs. Two notable attempts include that of Dr. Vladimir Demikhov in 1950s who transplanted a dog head to create a two-headed dog, and Dr. Robert White's attempt to transplant a monkey head in 1970. The monkey survived for nine days before its body's immune system rejected the head.

Canavero's believes that today's medical technology can make such transplants completely successful and the individual can begin to walk and function within a year after procedure.

If successful, Canavero maintains that his technique could be very useful for the paralyzed and those suffering with advanced cancer. However head transplant is not a subject most people are comfortable with and is expected to rake an ethics issue whenever attempted.