Lost your head? Scientist plans first human head transplant

The world’s first attempt to transplant a human head will be launched this year at a surgical conference in the US, according to the New Scientist.

The idea proposed by Sergio Canavero ofthe Turin Advanced Neuromodulation Group, is to be announced in June with the aim of getting support from interested parties to work towards the surgery, it was reported.

It is not the first time the controversial Italian surgeon has suggested the proposal. He first mooted the idea in 2013, in which he hoped to use the surgery to extend the lives of people whose muscles and nerves have degenerated or whose organs are riddled with cancer.

Now he claims the surgery could be ready as early as 2017.

This month, Dr Canavero published a summary of the technique, which would involve cooling the recipient’s head and the donor body to extend the time their cells can survive without oxygen. The magazine reported that the spinal cord would then be fused together using a chemical called polyethylene glycol, which encourages fat within cell membranes to mesh.

The recipient then would be kept in a coma for three or four weeks to prevent moment, while being able to move and feel their face, as well as speak with the same voice, Dr Canavero predicts.

In 1970, a team led by Robert White at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland, Ohio, transplanted the head of one monkey onto the body of another. While the monkey could no move its body, as the spinal cords had not been connected, it was able to breathe with artificial assistance. The monkey lived for nine days until its immune system rejected the head.

‘Outlandish’

Many in the surgical community, however, have said the proposed project was “too outlandish” to be a serious consideration.

Harry Goldsmith, a clinical professor of neurological surgery at the University of California, Davis, told the New Scientist: “I don’t believe it will ever work, there are too many problems with the procedure. Trying to keep someone healthy in a coma for four weeks – it’s not going to happen.”