"If we can keep a severed head alive...".

"If we can keep a severed head alive...".

not be a matter for criticism. The aim of the new society is to provide an alternative to the existing bodies, not to replace them, and nor is it to disadvantage any other elements of the profession. In his review of my book (3 September, p 629) Professor T J Hamblin stated, "In [Fleming's] view a device to perfuse a human head might lead to horrific consequences, and so he has developed a fien...

Why move the eyes if we can move the head?

To see while moving is a very basic and integrative sensorimotor function in vertebrates. To maintain visual acuity, the oculomotor system provides efficient compensatory eye movements for head and visual field displacements. Other types of eye movement allow the selection of new visual targets and binocular vision and stereopsis. Motor and premotor neuronal circuits involved in the genesis and...

'....officiously to keep alive'.

Modern medical technology has provided powerful tools with which to initiate and sustain life and understandable concern is being expressed about scientists and doctors 'playing God.' The view that 'the clinician's freedom to stop intensive treatment when the probable outcome is severe handicap is part of the package of neonatology" is far from unanimous. The hard facts are, however, that today...

Why Keep Them Alive

How to keep photoreceptors alive.

O ver the last 40 years, there has been increasing success in the surgical treatment of retinal detachment in that the retinal reattachment could be achieved in a high proportion of cases but visual recovery was frequently poor. An explanation for this poor visual outcome was derived from work on experimental retinal detachment in which it was shown that photoreceptor cell death occurred becaus...