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An Australian news service reports that scientific experts (a.k.a. boffins -- what a label!) have successfully revived dogs after they were clinically dead for three hours.

US scientists have succeeded in reviving the dogs after three hours of clinical death, paving the way for trials on humans within years.

Pittsburgh's Safar Centre [sic] for Resuscitation Research has developed a technique in which subject's veins are drained of blood and filled with an ice-cold salt solution.

The animals are considered scientifically dead, as they stop breathing and have no heartbeat or brain activity.

The technique, developed by a research team in Pittsburgh, offers hope to trauma victims, such as battlefield casualties or victims of violent crime, who have lost lots of blood. (Previous research showed that the technique could "enable survival without brain damage after exsanguination cardiac arrest of 60 minutes even in the presence of trauma.") The research was sponsored by the U.S. Navy.

-- CAV