A look inside a Scottsdale cryogenics facility freezing bodies for the future

A look inside an Arizona cryogenics facility freezing bodies for the future

Alcor Life Extension Foundation, which is based in Scottsdale, Arizona, is freezing patients after they die so that one day, they might live again. FOX News' Jackie Ibanez reports.

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. - A Scottsdale cryogenics company is freezing patients after they die so that one day, they might live again.

Inside their aluminum tanks of liquid nitrogen are the bodies and heads of roughly 200 people.

The canisters are housed at an Alcor Life Extension Foundation's facility in Scottsdale, Arizona, and the patients inside - many of whom passed away from terminal illnesses - are preserving their bodies for the future.

"Instead of just disposing of the patient, give them to us," said Max More with the Alcor Life Extension Foundation. "We're going to stabilize them, stop them getting worse, and hold them for as long as it takes for technology to catch up and allow them to come back to life."

In order to be cryogenically frozen, a person must first be declared legally dead. But biologically, Alcor officials say a person's organs and body can be saved almost indefinitely.

"Dying is a process, and cryonics stops that process," More said.

An ice bath, mechanical CPR device and a respirator work together to cool down a patient's body. Various medications are also used to prevent cells from damaging over time.

Patients are then wrapped in what they refer to as a "sleeping bag" before being placed inside their tank.

Meanwhile, critics say cryogenics is nothing more than science fiction.

"Mainstream brain scientists, physiologists.... They're not lining up saying, 'I think this is a sound idea,'" said bioethics professor Arthur Caplan.

But supporters say:

"[In]1978, the first test tube baby was considered shocking, immoral, unethical and people wondered, is this a human? And the same type of criticism is often reflected on cryonics," said futurist Natasha Vita-More.

It will cost a minimum of $200,000 to freeze an entire body, or $80,000 to just freeze the brain.