"Freeze and chop my body": an old woman bequeathed to cut and digitize her corpse
The elderly lady personally examined the saw, which later cut her body into pieces for 60 days. What prompted the elderly woman to become a scientific exhibit? Find out the details of the most unusual experiment in the last decade.
An elderly resident of Denver, Colorado, became the first person who voluntarily decided to give her body for freezing and digitization.
Sue Potter died at the age of 87 from pneumonia. After the woman's death, her body was frozen and cut into 27,000 fragments. After three years, all the parts were digitized and presented as educational material to students.
For 15 years, from the moment when she bequeathed her body to science, and until her death, Sue entered in a notebook all the details of her life, described the sensations and diseases. She personally examined the cutting saw, the refrigerator, and the chemicals to treat her body after death. The woman wanted the cutting process to take place surrounded by roses and accompanied by classical music.
She suffered from a variety of illnesses, including diabetes and breast cancer. In 2000, Sue read an article about an unusual project at the Colorado Institute of Experimental Techniques. It was about freezing and digitizing two corpses (a man and a woman) for the purpose of studying by students of the medical faculty. This impressed Mrs. Potter so much that she decided to bequeath her body to science.
No one expected that after writing a will, an elderly woman would live for another 15 years. She became a favorite among the teachers and students of the university.Mrs. Potter always carried a card with her that said:
Sue Potter couldn't have ended her life any other way — she was too extraordinary to leave like everyone else. The technical process of processing her body was very complex: the saw worked automatically 24 hours a day for two months. After that, laborious processes began with the organs, tissues, muscles and skeleton, so that their smallest details became visible.
Well, science does not stand still. Perhaps, in time, this way of finding peace will become quite commonplace, along with cremation and ordinary burial. Would you like to become a scientific exhibit after you die?