Underwater Undertaking
"In life, radio disc jockey Roby Yonge was pretty weird. Best known for propagating on-air the "Paul is dead" rumor about Beatles member Paul McCartney in 1969, he believed in life on other planets and was obsessed with discovering the mythical lost city of Atlantis. Now, nine years after his death, Yonge's family has found the storied city for him--in name, at least--and plans to make it his final resting place. Under construction 3 miles off the coast of Key Biscayne, Fla., Atlantis Memorial Reef is an underwater graveyard and scuba attraction that will open in July, and eventually hold the remains of up to 80,000 people ...."
or maybe you'ld rather go with
Freeze-Drying Technique
If cremation doesn't strike you as being quite eco-friendly enough, try a new technique developed by Swedish biologist Susanne Wiigh-Mäsak. Her company, Promessa Organic, based in Nosund, a town in western Sweden, is pioneering a method to freeze-dry remains. The body is dipped into liquid nitrogen and then vibrated to shatter it into powder as a vacuum removes the body's liquids. Next, contraption picks out any metals that may have constituted prosthetics or dental fillings. Finally, the powder is placed in a small box made of potato or corn starch and buried in a shallow grave, where it disintegrates, typically in less than a year. For more information, visit here
or
Wearable Remains
A Chicago-based company called Lifegem makes synthetic diamonds using the carbon from cremated remains, to turn your dearly departed into wearable keepsakes. The process involves a diamond press that turns a body's carbon into graphite to produce clear and colored diamonds. Started in 2001, the firm now has offices in the U.K., the Netherlands, Japan, Australia and South Africa, according to co-founder Rusty Vanden Biesen. It takes less than an 8-ounce cup of cremated ashes to produce a gem, from a $2,700 one-quarter-carat yellow diamond to $20,000 for a one-carat blue diamond. For more information, visit here
or
Eternal Reefs
Atlanta-based Eternal Reefs mixes cremated remains into balls of cast concrete. The reefs, which friends and relatives can help create, are placed offshore in various locations and cost $1,000 to $5,000 and include an inscribed bronze plaque. They are touted as "permanent living legacies" for encouraging coral growth and fish habitat to restore the eco-system. Each reef ball can accommodate up to four sets of cremated remains for an extra $250 each. Pets are welcome too. For more information, visit here
or
Get Out
Space Services can you give you a celestial boost. For $1,000, the Houston-based firm will arrange for a 1-gram vial of cremated remains to be sent into orbit. For $5,300, the company will launch 7 grams of cremains in an aluminum tube into orbits that can last up to 60 years. SSI has sent the remains of more than 400 people, including counterculture guru Timothy Leary, into space with partner aerospace firms since 1997. Its upcoming launch, scheduled for this fall at Vandenberg Air Force base in California, will include the remains of the former Mercury 7 astronaut L. Gordon Cooper Jr. and late actor James Doohan who played Scotty on Star Trek. For more information, visit here
or
be one with a tree
U.K.-based firm Biopresence is hoping to take it first customers by late this year. The service? Merging human DNA with that of a tree. Still in its research and design phase, the company got its start two years ago with seed money from the British National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts. It plans to create a method to infuse human DNA into a "custom tree," transcoding the essence of a person to create "transgenic tombstones" without genetically modifying the plant. For more information, visit here
.
No comments:
Post a Comment