00:00When the blood stops circulating to the brain, you have mere moments to revive someone, lest
00:08the damage to their central nervous system's epicenter be irreparable.
00:12However, scientists in China have recently resuscitated the brains of pigs after nearly
00:16an hour of death, restoring brain function.
00:19When the heart stops beating and blood ceases to circulate to organs, that is called ischemia.
00:24Experts have long believed that this plays a key role in death, especially with regards
00:28to ischemia in certain organs, so researchers sought to figure out if preventing liver ischemia
00:33might aid in resuscitating euthanized animals.
00:36And it did.
00:37Looking at the pigs post-mortem, the group that had liver ischemia prevented had the
00:40least brain damage.
00:42What's more, subsequent resuscitations, which incorporated the liver into an artificial
00:45life support system, were actually better at reviving the pigs.
00:49What's more, their brains were also reactivated, with the researchers detecting electrical
00:53activity, though none of the subjects survived for very long after.
00:56If these results are transitive to human patients, this could be a massive jump forward
01:00in medicine, aiding doctors in widening the narrow window in which they have to resuscitate
01:05patients who have experienced sudden cardiac arrest.
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