Dr. Gary Steinberg

So besides drugs that were tried...

Another method of protecting the brain was tried called mild hypothermia.

And that was a process of reducing the brain temperature and body temperature just a few degrees from 37 degrees centigrade to 33.

And we were one of the first to show that.

that that was protective even after the stroke in animals?

Right.

And in fact, deep hypothermia has a profound effect on shutting down the metabolism.

So that's why when someone, particularly kids, fall into a frozen pond with ice-cold water, they can survive there for half an hour.

and make a complete recovery because their body temperature is dropped down to very low, like 20 degrees centigrade.

But this is less.

This is just a few degrees.

So there is a slight decrease in the metabolic activity, but that does not account for all the protection.

It's due to the fact that hypothermia, mild hypothermia, blocks many of those detrimental pathways.

It blocks

partly the release of those excitatory amino acids, glutamate.

It blocks the calcium influx.

It blocks the inflammation.

And so that's probably why it works so well.

It even blocks that other pathway of programmed cell death.

Because it hits all these pathways, it's multifactorial, it's very effective.