CLEVELAND - Dr. Maria Siemionow, a reconstructive plastic surgeon, wants to attempt the world's first face transplant.
In the next few weeks, five men and seven women will secretly visit the Cleveland Clinic to interview for the chance to have a radical operation that's never been tried anywhere in the world.

They will smile, raise their eyebrows, close their eyes, open their mouths. Dr. Maria Siemionow will study their cheekbones, lips and noses. She will ask what they hope to gain and what they most fear. Then she will ask, "Are you afraid that you will look like another person?"

Siemionow wants to attempt a face transplant. It is this: to give people horribly disfigured by burns, accidents or other tragedies a chance at a new life. These people already have lost the sense of identity that is linked to the face; the transplant is merely "taking a skin envelope" and slipping their identity inside. If a transplant succeeds, many people who live in misery could benefit.