The Italian neurosurgeon Sergio Canavero has been gearing up for a surgery that may never take place. His proposition? Transfer an ill individual’s head—or possibly just the brain—onto a younger, more robust body.
Canavero generated buzz in 2017 when he declared that a team he was advising in China had swapped heads between two cadavers. However, he never convinced the doubters that his method could succeed—or to trust his assertion that a procedure on a living individual was forthcoming. The Chicago Tribune dubbed him the “P.T. Barnum of transplantation.”
Canavero stepped back from the limelight. Yet, the notion of head transplants isn’t fading away. Instead, he claims, the idea has recently been receiving renewed interest from life-extension advocates and discreet Silicon Valley startups.
Career track
It’s been tumultuous. After he commenced sharing his surgical insights a decade ago, Canavero states that he received his “pink slip” from the Molinette Hospital in Turin, where he had dedicated 22 years of service. “I’m an outsider. So that has made things more challenging, I must say,” he states.
Reason for persistence
No alternative solution for aging is on the horizon. “It’s become absolutely evident over the past years that the prospect of some extraordinary tech to rejuvenate elderly individuals—occurring in some hidden lab, like Google—is truly going nowhere,” he explains. “You have to go for the complete package.”
The complete package?
He means acquiring a new body, not merely one new organ. Canavero displays a great command of English idioms and an unexpected Southern accent. He attributes this to a childhood fascination with American comics. “For me, mastering the language of my heroes was crucial,” he remarks. “So I can chat casually.”
Cloned bodies
Canavero is now functioning as an independent researcher and has consulted for entrepreneurs aspiring to create brainless human clones as a source of DNA-compatible organs that would not be rejected by a recipient’s immune system. “I can assure you there are individuals from leading universities involved,” he says.
Future plans
Integrating the necessary technologies, such as consistently precise surgical robots and artificial wombs for cloning, will be intricate and exceedingly costly. Canavero lacks the resources to advance his plans, but he believes “the funding is out there” for a commercial moonshot initiative: “What I say to the billionaires is ‘Unite.’ You will each secure your share, plus achieve immortality.”
