u/AlcorCryonics

Happy Monday!

Check out these flicks that were captured last week by our social media strategist Sam.

As mentioned in previous posts, Alcor's office is getting a full makeover. While we dust off the facility's history, we've found a lot of neat relics and decor along the way.

The framed quote by the inventor of the first liquid-fueled rocket, Robert H. Goddard, felt especially apt.

Construction for our facility refresh has pushed most of the staff into makeshift offices, so Kaiya and Alyssa have been learning the ropes from Diane in the middle of it all. They've been picking things up fast and having fun along the way. Before long, they'll be among the voices on the other end when you reach out to Alcor.

Welcome to the team.

Crews are at work on new paint, new flooring, and more. These are the early stages of a larger refresh and expansion of the facility, aimed at a better experience for members and visitors.  

We'll share more details as things progress, so follow along here as Alcor's new look comes together.

This year has brought significant change - with much more in the works. As we head towards our upcoming Annual Strategic Meeting on Sept 5th, we're reshaping our facility so that the space begins to reflect the progress already happening from within.

Stay tuned.

Alcor's engineers pulling thick strands of fog from a giant liquid nitrogen dewar with a gravity siphon pipe, while transferring a neuropod into long-term storage.

As soon as the massive cork is removed, warm room air rushes in and instantly condenses into dense fog when it hits the ultra-cold nitrogen vapors rising from the surface. On humid monsoon days in Arizona, it gets so thick you can barely see inside.

Clearing the fog is critical. The team needs clear visibility to carefully slide the new neuropod into its tight spot among the others.

The latest Alcor Newsletter is out.

This edition circles back to a thread we left open last issue – a landmark DART training, and the dramatic turn it took while underway.

Visit our blog to read the full issue.

Notice those two stars hanging above the tree?

Alcor founders Linda and Fred Chamberlain believed humanity would one day travel to the stars, and while searching star catalogs for a fitting name, they chose Alcor, a dim companion star to the bright Mizar star, which was long used as a test of keen eyesight. The idea was that if you can see Alcor's purpose, you have excellent "vision."

Do you have the "vision" as well? If so what's your vision of the future?

Roman, one of Alcor's newest engineering interns, designing and fabricating a stabilizing bracket for our dewars.

During cooldowns, the internal fans in the dewar tops can generate vibrations. To address this, Roman developed a custom bracket coupling different structural elements of the dewar to dampen this effect.

Happy birthday to Garrett Lambrecht from Alcor's Member Services team! 🎂

Given free rein to pick any birthday cake he wanted, Garrett chose carrot. He claims he "just really loves the taste," but we all know the truth: carrot rhymes with Garrett, and the man simply cannot resist a branded dessert.

When asked how another birthday come and gone makes him feel about the brevity of life, Garrett went quiet, staring into the distance as he carefully buried the cold and harsh reality of the aging process somewhere deep in his psyche. Once it was fully hidden away, he rebooted mid-blink, and with awkward, overcompensating cheer informed us that 7-Eleven gives out free Slurpees on July 11th...

We feel you, brother. That's exactly why we do what we do here at Alcor. 🥕

In 2012, Kim Suozzi, a 23 year old college student with a burgeoning curiosity for neuroscience was suddenly diagnosed with a highly aggressive form of brain cancer. Confronted with a terminal prognosis, and a sudden awareness of her mortality, Kim began looking into cryonics.

She decided to share her story online in hopes of fundraising her cryopreservation:

“I'm trying to be preserved because I've done everything else in my power to help me extend my life. I've looked at essentially every diet, supplement, clinical trial, and "miracle treatment" out there. This is the last thing I can possibly do to fight for another chance, and if does happen to work, it will be incredible.

Live again or die trying.”

Support from the cryonics community, along with assistance from Alcor made her dream possible. Kim was cryopreserved on January 17th, 2013.

Her story continues to inspire people who believe that preserving the possibility of tomorrow is worth pursuing.

Wonjin is standing next to a differential scanning calorimeter, a nifty tool in cryobiology. It measures how heat moves in and out of a sample.

By tracking heat flow, we can pinpoint the temperature at which a sample freezes or safely vitrifies into a glass like state - letting us study how cryoprotective agents like M22 behave across temperatures.

The calorimeter is already in the lab and the team is putting it to work- but there’s still an open chapter on offsetting its funding. An up to $25,000 matching donation campaign is still active, so donating today will double the impact of your gift.

https://www.every.org/alcor/f/matching-donation-fundraiser