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Updated: Feb 8, 2026

A Multi-hole Cryovial Eliminates Freezing Artifacts when Muscle Tissues are Directly Immersed in Liquid Nitrogen
Published on: April 6, 2017
A safety comparative study between freezing nitrogen ethanol composite and liquid nitrogen for cryotherapy of
Cheng-Fong Chen1, Hui-Chun Chu2, Chao-Ming Chen3
1Department of Orthopaedics & Traumatology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan; Department of Orthopaedics, Therapeutical and Research Center of Musculoskeletal Tumor, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan; Orthopaedic Department School of Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, Taiwan.
Abstract:
Freezing nitrogen ethanol composite (FNEC) showed effective cryoablative ability for bone tumor ex vivo and in vivo comparable to liquid nitrogen (LN). We therefore wished to compare the radiant cooling damage of the surrounding tissue between FNEC and LN. The evaluation of the radiant cooling damage was demonstrated human bone xenograft transplantation (HXT) in a mouse model. Characterizations and quantifications of the damaging effects on morphologic features and apoptosis of the cryoablative surrounding bone tissue, muscle and epidermal layer of skin were compared. The radiant cooled damaging effects including epidermal rupture, hair follicle atrophy, dermis and subcutaneous crystal vacuolation of skin were significantly greater in LN than FNEC. Muscular apoptosis, structural shrinkage and bone cellular apoptosis were supposedly 15%-33% destroying degrees of LN more than FNEC. We concluded that FNEC is an innovative cryogenic material, and it could cause less cryoablative damage to surrounding normal tissue than LN. The findings might support the safety of FNEC being applied in clinical cryoablation therapy.
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