A summary on Dr Leir

One of the most controversial, but important fields of research in present day ufology is the surgical retrieval, and subsequent laboratory analysis, of alleged alien implants found in the body of persons who had a ufo experience of some kind, possibly an abduction.

Until 1995, few attempts had been made, and no decisive result had been achieved to " prove " the alien origin of any implant retrieved. The best known case is the bizarre story of the Richard Price alleged implant, studied during about five years by the reputed physicist David Pritchard, professor at MIT. After having mentioned its metallic nature at the beginning, he finally diagnosed a... cotton fiber (see Alien Discussions. Proceedings ot the Alien Study Conference, at MIT in 1992, pp 279 to 295).

This matter took a new turn in 1995 when Dr Roger K. Leir, podiatric physicien and surgeon in California, accepted to extract an implant spotted by radiography in the foot of an alleged abductee, a case which was presented to him by Texan researcher Derrel Sims. From 1995 to 2001, ten operations have been performed, either by Dr Leir himself or by other surgeons with his assistance when the implant was in other parts of the body. Several laboratory analyses have been performed, with findings partly made public. Some of the surgeries and implant analyses have been sponsored by the National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS), a private research group created by Robert Bigelow in Las Vegas. No decisive results have been published yet but the data gathered by Dr Leir and his partners in this research are already impressive enough to deserve the attention of all ufo researchers.

Dr Roger K. Leir was subjected repeatedly to hard critics of all kinds as soon as he began talking publicly about his surgeries on alleged alien implants (see note below on that aspect of the story). I had the chance to meet Dr Leir in September 1999, at the international UFO Conference in Leeds (Great-Britain), where I was invited as a speaker. I was reading his book and we had dinner together. I can testify that I discovered a sympathetic and credible man, quite different from some ad hominem critics made against him.

One serious critic, however, is that he and his colleagues have not written yet a scientific article, accepted by a reputed scientific review. While this is a serious shortcoming, it also appears that a significant amount of credible information is available about these operations, the objects removed, the alleged abductees and their personal stories. Let’s try to review briefly some basic informations about them. In another note, the french physician Jacques Costagliola gives a more technical appraisal of these data.

Here is the list of surgical extractions of alleged implants, performed either by Dr Roger Leir (in the case of foot implants) or by other surgeons with his assistance. This list is drawn from the book of Dr Leir, The Aliens and the Scalpel, published in 1998, and from several articles for later operations (see the list below). For anyone interested, the first thing to do is to buy his book and read it. It may be ordered on his web site at :

According to Table 1 (page 164) of his book, 8 operations took place from 1995 to 1998

(date, name, place and shape of implant are given here). Most of the names are pseudonyms given by Dr Leir in his book.

1) 8-19-95, Patricia. Two implants in left toe, both metallic, one with the shape of a " cantaloupe seed ", and one with a " T " shape

8) 8-17-98, Pablo. Left hand, metallic, again shape of a " cantaloupe seed ", like previous ones (filmed by NBC and aired in February 1999)

9) 2-5-2000, Tim Cullen (real name). Left wrist, metallic, " cantaloupe seed " (case presented at the Laughlin UFO Congress of March 2000 with the presence of Tim Cullen. Reported in the Mufon UFO Journal of May 2000, and at the Mufon Symposium of July 2000, at Irvine, California (see the Proceedings of the symposium, available at Mufon). As I was invited as a speaker at that conference, I had the chance to meet Tim Cullen and I found him to be a reliable person. He is a strong, healthy an good tempered man, running a small construction business, and he certainly has no need of such publicity for his profession.

10) 10-29-2001, stewardess for a major airline. Small lump in the right arm, the size of a pea.
(Case presented at the Laughlin UFO Congress, March 2002. Report in the British UFO Magazine of May 2002 and in the Mufon UFO Journal of November 2002. Also presented at the Leeds International UFO Conference, 20-22 September 2002). According to Dr Leir, this implant is a special case, " totally biological ".

Two series of tests have been performed in 1998 under the direction of NIDS, more precisely of Colonel John Alexander who was a prominent member of its team of scientific advisers (Colonel Alexander had a long career in secret military studies, notably at Los Alamos National Laboratory). hey were performed first at Los Alamos National Laboratory and later at New Mexico Tech. In his book, his articles and conferences, Roger Leir mentions studies made in other laboratories, but the precise results have not been published yet.

We first have the results of the analysis done at New Mexico Tech in 1996, paid by NIDS and published on its web site, at :

This analysis shows a remarkable and very unusual metallic composition of the fragments studied.

In addition to this document, we have the " letter of opinion " of the metallurgist engineer who did the tests, Mr Paul A. Fuierer. It is not on the NIDS site, but it is reproduced by Dr Roger Leir in his book, with his comments, and on his own web site, at :

It seems important to signal here that this metallusrgist gave in fact two successive opinions. When he gave the first one, he had not been informed at all of the origin of the fragment. He expressed the opinion that its metallic components were similar to those found in meteorites. When he received this first letter of opinion, Dr Leir was so surprised that he called the metallurgist and informed him that the fragment had been extracted from a human body. Mr Fuierer, who is known to be a skeptic regarding ufos, gave then an additionnal opinion. He stated that an iron-silver mixture imbedded into the body could cause a calcification reaction, with a resulting material comparable to ceramic materials used in medecine and dentistry. But Dr Leir notes in his book that such materials are no longer in use because they produce a " tremendous inflammatory reaction ". However, none of the implants had produced such a reaction. The metallurgist did not know that, and he did not know either that "a strange, gray, dense biological membrane covered the specimens. Last of all, there was no evidence of a portal of entry " (p. 170 of Dr Leir’s book).

That letter of opinion is also on the web site of the Abduction Information Centre (AIC) managed by John Velez, on which we have in addition some critics of the New Mexico Tech analysis, at :

As for the analyses done at Los Alamos, it seems that they are presented, rather briefly, and only in the book of Dr Leir, which he published on his own initiative. It is important to stress here that, in the initial agreement between NIDS and the Leir-Sims team, it was understood that NIDS would publish a scientific article (according to Leir in his book). But instead of that, in 1996 they pushed Leir to publish rapidly an article in the Mufon UFO Journal (see p 175 of the book). Let’s hope that the goal of a scientific publication will be reached in a not too distant future. In any case, Dr Leir told me how grateful he was for the help provided by Robert Bigelow and NIDS.

Mufon July 2001 Symposium Proceedings : " Alien abduction – Alien implants. Why ? " by Dr Leir.

UFO magazine (US), January 1999 : " NBC Special to air surgical removal of purported implant, by Jack Carlson.

UFO Magazine (GB), May 2002 : in the account of the Laughlin UFO congress, by Graham Birdsall.

As seen in the list above, two main kinds of implants were found , metallic (of various shapes), and non-metallic (little balls). In his book, Dr Roger Leir gives his summary of the biological and metallurgical findings (pp 162 to 171). The following is a very brief description of these findings. In another article, the french doctor Jacques Costagliola gives a detailed description and appraisal of them.

"Four produced metallic objects covered by dark, grey, shiny membranes that could not be opened with a surgical blade. This membrane was shown to consist of protein coagulum, hemosiderin, and keratin. All three of these substances are naturally occurring in the body, but our investigation has shown no record of this combination in the medical litterature.

"The soft tissues adjacent to the metallic objects underwent analysis, and the findings demonstrated conglomerations of nerve cells and a total lack of inflammatory response ".

In a new article, published by the Mufon UFO Journal of November 2002, Leir puts apart the last implant, extracted in October 2001. According to him, it is " totally biological, bivalved, yellowish in color and had the ability to move by itself underneath the skin ". He noticed that strange ability on the first medical examination : " The object would move anywhere within a circle of about two and a half inches ". Unfortunately, that implant has not yet been studied in depth, for lack of funding. The only analysis has been a microscopic examination at Digital Instruments Laboratories in Santa barbara, CA.


Implant in the shape of a " cantaloupe seed) (Tim Cullen’s implant)	Implant in " T " shape (Patricia’s implant)

" Three of the surgeries consisted of the removal of a skin lesion with an attached small BB-sized, greyish-white round ball in the underlying soft tissue. We found solar elastosis, clusters of nerve cells, and either minimal or no inflammation present ".

- All subjects showed abnormal reactions to procaine local anesthetics (no reactions, or allergic reactions).

In addition to that, it is to be noted that all appeared " normal " according to a PhD psychologist.

Eve Frances Lorgen has interviewed five of the persons subjected to surgeries, and she found that " All persons, one male and four females, shared one thing in common : Ufo encounters and contact with non-human alien beings " (Mufon UFO Journal, Nov. 1998). They also said that they were satisfied of the surgery, and would do it again if necessary.

The two more recent cases fall in that category as well. Tim Cullen had a close encounter in 1978, when travelling in his car with his wife. He talked about it only twenty years later when he felt his children were old enough to hear about it. I met him and found him very credible.

The airline stewardess, who had an operation in October 2001, remembers seing a ufo at night about twenty years ago. She was woken in her bedroom by a a very strange bright white light, and saw a circular craft outside, hovering motionlessly. The next morning, she discovered a strange lump in her right arm : it was the implant whis has been extracted in 2001.

The main findings being on the internet (see above), I will just quote Dr Leir’s book, about an interesting description of the T-shaped object (in Patricia’s foot) :

"The T-shaped object is composed of two small metallic rods. The horizontal portion contains a magnetic iron core that is harder than the finest carbide steel. A complex layer of elements covers the core, forming a cladding. One portion of this cladding has a cristalline band, which circles the rod. When viewing this rod, as seen in the electronphotomicrograph, it appears to be structured. One end is in the shape of a barb while the opposite end is flat. In the center is a small depression. The shape of this depression conforms exactly to the shape of one end of the vertical rod. The vertical rod contains a similar cladding, but the core is composed of carbon instead or iron and it is magnetoconductive, but not magnetic ".

There are other interesting findings, but it would be too long to list them all. At least should be mentioned electromagnetic properties, notably on Tim Cullen’s implant, when the object was still in place in the body. Dr Leir was assisted in this area by electronic engineer Bob Beckwith, and Greg Avery, Mufon state director for Louisiana. First, with a simple Gaussmeter, they found a 3 to 6 milligauss reading. Then, in spite of some difficulties, they were able to detect " a pulse reading ", which " showed there was a signal being generated and one being received by the object "

Leir has presented that case at the conferences in Laughlin, March 2000, and MUFON Symposium of July 2001. I have the text published in the proceedings of the MUFON Symposium of 2001. In it, Leir mentions new tests being done with excellent equipments at Digital Instruments Inc., in Santa Barbara, California. He mentions outstanding equipments called Atomic Force Microscope, and Atomic Field Microscope.
According to Dr Leir, further studies were done " by another world-class laboratory in Texas ", which revealed that the main elemental component was iron, and, although it was amorphous, they were amazed to find that it was highly magnetic. They explained to Leir that " we have no such process for accomplishing this feat ".

To conclude this very short summary, I suggest to all persons interested in ufology not to discard the already long story of Dr Leir’s implants.

Dr Roger Leir was subjected to harsh personal critics, especially on the Internet, ever since he began his surgeries, in 1995. His medical competence was questioned, and his honesty as well. However, his medical competence is indebatable. After attaining his Bachelor of Science degree at the University of South California in 1961, he received his Doctor of Podiatric Medecine in 1964. As for his honesty, it is to be noted that several surgeries were performed at no charge, and that he has not made a fortune, as we are going to see.

Dr Leir got into deep trouble in 1999. I just recall here the scenario:
- Publication of his book in 1998.
- An operation filmed by NBC in August 1998, and shown publicly in February 1999 (NBC special "Confirmation").
Then the sky fell upon him. In a second version of this book, published in 2000 (see on his website), Leir tells the story.
- On April 23, Leir received an advice of the California Medical Board which dug an old, forgotten complaint made ten years before, and put him on probation during three years.
It appeared that the complainant had died five years before, and that the hospital where the surgery had taken place had been closed for seven years, with no records available !
Shortly after, his partner Derrel Sims, who had been increasingly critical of him, broke their agreement (April 26).
- In May 1999, Leir had a heart attack, due to stress according to the doctors. He was in great danger, because surgery was impossible, Leir having had already by-pass operations in the heart. In June, Derrel Sims made an urgent appeal for help, especially financial help becauce Roger Leir was in deep trouble, with heavy medical bills and no income.

During the following months, Leir made it through. He was able to come to the Leeds Conference in September 1999, where I met him. He told me he had well recovered, and that his medical probation had been cancelled.

This has not the only attack against Dr Leir. He has been repeatedly subjected to heavy and bitter critics by a number of people, some of whom were probably not well informed about him and his research. See for instance, on the internet, the archives of the List UFO Updates for the last summer, under the thread " On The Surgical Removal Of Alleged Alien Implants "), at :

Having met him and having had a good exchange with him, I took his defense on UFO Updates, the more so as he refuses to answer to his critics. In fact, this summary is drawn from my messages on that list. John Velez, a member of the list who had criticized him, finally thanked me for these informations, which he found " compelling ", and asked my permission to put them on his web site (his message of September 10, 2002). In September, physicist and ufologist Stanton Friedman, who was back from the International UFO Conference in Leeds, praised Leir’s speech there, calling it " outstanding ".

In the case of the laboratory studies made through NIDS, it seems that the right of publication belongs to NIDS. Let's quote here what Roger Leir said about that in his book The Aliens and the Scalpel, published in 1998. He detailed the initial requests of Robert Bigelow to him and Sims, for an agreement (pp141 and 142) :
" One of the most important of these was a request from him not to divulge who was working on these implant specimens. In the beginning, he emphasized that not even NIDS was to be mentioned. In addition, he requested that we keep confidential the names of the laboratories they were using for the tests.
" This request turned out to be one of the easier parts of the bargain to keep because they did not tell us to whom they sent the samples. The third part of our arrangement was a request for
us not to release or publish any analysis results until we received clearance from NIDS. At that point they would also advise us as to where they thought it should be published.

" These points were difficult to agree to, but Derrel and I carefully weighed them against the benefits Bigelow offered:

- An unlimited supply of funds for the project at hand ;
- The use of the world's finest laboratory facilities ;
- A quality of testing which could not be surpassed ;
- Peer review by the NIDS board, which included some of the finest scientific minds in the United States ;
- The possibility of having an article published in a scientific journal. "

Another interesting aspect of the story, as told by Dr Leir, is that both Bigelow and Colonel Alexander were very eager to make an agreement. When Leir first contacted Colonel Alexander, on advice of his cousin Kenneth Ring who knew him as a scientific researcher, in his words "a brillant scientists who had worked with him in the NDE field" (p 87), he reacted promptly. Alexander and Bigelow called Leir at 7 am to ask him to come with Sims to Las Vegas!

Three surgeries had been done already, before the NIDS agreement, in 1995 and 1996. NIDS funded the following surgeries, and laboratory tests for several implants found. After the first tests were made, Bigelow asked Leir his agreement for a quick publication in the Mufon UFO Journal, but Leir considered that they should wait for more complete tests. He was aiming at a scientific publication (p 175). However, the first article, signed by Dr Leir, appeared in the April 1996 issue of the Mufon UFO Journal. A second one, more detailed, was published in the issue of June 1998. The same year, Leir published his book, presenting the 8 surgeries performed from 1995 to 1998. It seems that NIDS was not in full agreement with the book since there is a sticker on the first page saying :
"The contents, views and opinions of this book reflect the author and are not those of the Bigelow Foundation or NIDS".
NIDS has not respected yet the last term of the initial agreement, a publication in a peer reviewed scientific journal. Let’s hope that this goal may be reached soon.

Regarding the disagreement which gradually appeared between Roger Leir and Derrel Sims, I had the occasion to discuss that with them both. I met with Derrel Sims and he detailed his critics. In my opinion, this is a private affair between them. I restect the two men and I don’t have to choose between them. This question does not have to interfer in the debate about Dr Leir’s implants. This is also the opinion given to me by other people who know them.