Key facts
- Ren Xiaoping, a surgeon known for his head transplant research, performed a 12-hour operation in Russia.
- The surgery focused on a patient's severed spinal cord.
- The procedure took place last week at the Sklifosovsky Research Institute for Emergency Medicine in Moscow.
Ren Xiaoping, a surgeon who has previously expressed ambitions to perform the world's first human head transplant, has conducted a 12-hour operation in Russia aimed at severing and potentially reconnecting a patient's spinal cord. The procedure, described as a landmark surgery, took place last week at the Sklifosovsky Research Institute for Emergency Medicine in Moscow. Ren stated that the operation was a collaborative effort between his team from the Guangxi University of Chinese Medicine Second Affiliated Hospital and Russian medical personnel. Previous reports from 2015 indicated Ren's intention to perform human head transplants, with potential candidates like Valery Spiridonov, who suffers from a severe muscular atrophy, being discussed. At that time, Ren's research involved extensive experiments on animals, including mice and monkeys, and he had expressed a belief that the brain, not the body, constitutes the essence of a person.