So You Want to Donate Your Body to Science?
About 80 percent of the 20,000 bodies donated to science each year are used for anatomy lab dissections, where they will be used to train the next generation of American doctors and practice innovative new surgical techniques. But what about the other 20 percent?
Many will be discarded in a respectable manner, either due to excess donations or bodily problems. More will have their organs harvested for use in research. Some will be turned into skeletons, and may eventually find themselves displayed in museums, or hanging in the closets of science classrooms (though it's becoming rare to use real skeletons for the latter).
But a select few will live posthumous lives filled with daring, intrigue, excitement, and even controversy -- a death to remember!
Without further ado, here are eight strange uses for cadavers.
(Image: Wikimedia Commons)