• Thermal or Non-Thermal: That is the Question

This blog was posted previously on 8.06.2009 on http://www.stuk.fi/

When in year 2000 I began to attend the bioelectromagnetics scientific meetings I noticed that if someone commented that “the observed effects might be of thermal nature” this was the most certain way to “kill the presentation” and to nullify its scientific value. Why? Because it is commonly considered that present safety standards prevent any health hazard of thermal effects of mobile phone radiation. Another hot topic is whether mobile phone radiation, at levels permitted by the present safety standards, can induce or not, biological effects without the simultaneous increase of the temperature of the exposed biological material – the so-called non-thermal (or athermal) effects.

In 1998, ICNIRP published the “Guidelines for limiting exposure to time-varying electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields (up to 300 GHz).” (Health Physics, 1998, Volume 74, Number 4; http://www.icnirp.de/documents/emfgdl.pdf ). In these guidelines, any biological effects of mobile phone radiation induced by temperature rise of up to 1 deg. C were considered as harmless and this approach became a basis for setting the safety standard that is still in force. At the same time the research field of non-thermal (athermal) effects was described as confusing, as stated in the ICNIRP guidelines: “…Overall, the literature on athermal effects of AM electromagnetic fields is so complex, the validity of reported effects so poorly established, and the relevance of the effects to human health is so uncertain, that it is impossible to use this body of information as a basis for setting limits on human exposure to these fields.”.

According to the committees setting safety standard in Europe (ICNIRP) and USA (ICES) such small temperature increases of 0.1 – 0.3 deg. C induced by the mobile phone radiation exposure are meaningless when considering human health risk. The fact that the human body’s temperature is in the morning ca. 1 deg. C lower than in the evening is commonly presented as a supportive piece of evidence. This is seen to suggest that the increase of the body temperature by up to 1 deg. C can not be hazardous to health because it is within the normal physiological range. However, entirely another question is if small temperature increases induced by mobile phone radiation could be meaningful, from the point of view of the potential induction of biological effects? And yes, the temperature increases are small but do we know enough about their nature and kinetics to be convinced that they are unimportant for the physiology of e.g. brain? I think that the issue might not be so simple. There are two “problems” to consider.

Firstly, the temperature of human body indeed rises over the course of the day by up to 1 deg. C and the process is harmless. However, this process can not be directly compared with the local temperature increases caused by the mobile phone radiation. Such comparisons are omitting the time-scale of the event, its location and the involved physiological factors. To increase the temperature of the whole body it takes time (even hours). The process is preceded and accompanied by the production of humoral mediators that inform tissues and organs that the temperature increase is happening and cells have time to prepare protective responses. However, in case of the mobile phone radiation, the microwaves act locally by penetrating deeply into the body tissue (e.g. brain) and the temperature increase happens “instantaneously” and without any humoral mediators’ warning. The exposed brain cells are suddenly, without any warning, warmed up. This is a non-physiological event for the brain cells to which these cells have not been prepared throughout the evolutionary development. Thus, the direct comparison of the slow and uniform increase in body temperature by classical heating (e.g. sauna, hot-tube or sun-bathing) or by physiological processes (e.g. daily temperature fluctuations, physical exercises or fever) with mobile phone radiation-induced rapid and localized increase in temperature might not be justified.

Secondly, the radiation emitted by mobile phones might induce temperature hot spots within the exposed biological material, i.e. small areas where temperature might rise more than in the neighboring areas. We can detect and measure hot spots on the macro-scale but we do not have yet technology to measure whether hot spots are created on the micro-scale (sub-cellular-scale). Presently, dosimetry and modeling of the distribution and intensity of mobile phone radiation in the brain uses as a model plastic container molded in the form of half-head and filled with “physiological solution” consisting of water, salt and sugar. Such model represents human head with skull (plastic mold) and brain (water solution of salt and sugar). However, it is a great oversimplification of the reality, made simple for the sake of mathematical calculations, and it certainly distorts the results. Such simplified models are claimed to be necessity but at the same time we might be “throwing the baby with the bath water”.

Living tissues and cells are not homogenous environments but they are compartmentalized into cells and sub-cellular size volumes (organelles) that are delineated by lipid-containing hydrophobic membranes. Charged biological molecules and ions, unlike in the above mentioned “head model”, are not distributed within the tissue or cell uniformly and can’t travel freely. Thanks to the membranes and their selective transport mechanisms the distribution of molecules and ions in cells is non-uniform and produces electric gradients that play a paramount role in physiological functioning. Strong electromagnetic fields can disrupt the function of selective transport mechanisms of the membranes and cause profound physiological changes (e.g. electroporation).

The question to be answered is what happens when such hydrophobically compartmentalized environment is exposed to weak electromagnetic stimulus like mobile phone radiation. Will such exposure lead to formation of thermal hot spots on sub-cellular scale, because the free flow of charged molecules and ions is prevented by the selective transport mechanisms? Formation of such sub-cellular hot spots could cause changes in certain functional areas of the cell that eventually could lead to alterations in cell physiology. Furthermore, there have been identified so-called temperature-sensing molecules in the cell membranes. When activated by temperature change these molecules send stress signals through e.g. the p38MAPK/Hsp27 signaling pathway. Such stress signals reach cell nucleus and may affect expression of genes and alter cell physiology. Activation of the above mentioned pathway by mobile phone radiation was identified in our study (Leszczynski et al., Differentiation, vol. 70, year 2002, pp 120-129). However, we still do not know whether the triggering event for this pathway activation was the activation of temperature sensing molecules in cell membrane or some another event.

In my opinion it is possible to expect that the mobile phone radiation affects cells by the combination of thermal and non-thermal (if they exist) mechanisms. Thermal effects, induced by mobile phone radiation, should not be automatically regarded as unimportant in context of health risk evaluation because their occurrence and kinetics are dramatically different from the harmless physiological warming up of the body. Unfortunately, the presently available technologies do not yet permit to measure temperature or field distribution on sub-cellular scale. On the macro-scale of groups of thousands of cells, that are presently measurable, such sub-cellular hot spots would not be detectable.

It feels therefore puzzling why the research on sub-cellular scale dosimetry and on the effects of small increases in temperature does not get more attention from the committees for evaluating research and setting standards. As examples of such lack of interest can be mentioned the WHO Research agenda updated in 2006 and the outcome of the workshop organized in August 2007 in Washington, DC, by the US National Academies.

The WHO Research Agenda (http://www.who.int/peh-emf/research/rf_research_agenda_2006.pdf) has listed research needs and ranked them as either high priority research needs or as other research needs. In the chapter “Mechanisms”, the need for development of sub-cellular level micro-dosimetry does not get much support and is listed under the title of “Other research needs”:
“Micro-dosimetry research (i.e., at the cellular or subcellular levels) that may yield new insights concerning biologically relevant targets of RF exposure.
Rationale: Little is known about the field distribution at the micro-scale and consequences of non-uniformity of fields on sub-cellular structures and molecules in terms of mechanisms of bioeffects.”

The workshop in Washington was on “Identification of research needs relating to potential biological or adverse health effects of wireless communication devices”. The outcome report of this workshop was published by the committee assembled by the US National Academies (http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12036 ). Committee of seven scientists was chaired by Frank Barnes. Four of the committee members serve in different capacities for the ICNIRP and were involved in preparation of WHO Research Agenda.

For me, one of the more interesting presentations at the Washington workshop was by Prof. Guglielmo D’Inzeo from Italy. He discussed the importance of developing of sub-cellular micro-dosimetry as it will help not only to determine whether there might be non-uniformities in distribution of radiation (and temperature) on micro-scale but also it will help to determine the possible biophysical mechanism of the biological effects induced by mobile phone radiation. The issue is of real importance because, as mentioned above, we do not know if sub-cellular heating might cause biological effects. Such sub-cellular heating can not be compared with temperature increases on the whole-body-scale. Unfortunately, the committee that prepared the workshop report, did not see the issues of sub-cellular dosimetry and of studying cellular temperature sensors as important ones:
“Judged to Be of Lower Priority
2. It is unclear whether low-level RF exposure can trigger effects through stimulation of cellular thermo-receptors.
3. Knowledge is lacking concerning the effects of electromagnetic fields on ion and molecular transport through the cell membrane.”
(Chapter: Mechanisms; page 36 of the report).

I wonder why the committee was not interested in research that may lead to finding the biophysical mechanism of the biological effects induced by mobile phone radiation. At the same time, whenever any effect of mobile phone radiation is found in epidemiological, human, animal or in vitro studies, the first criticism is that the observation is unreliable because the mechanism of the effect is unknown. However, two reasonable approaches to find out such mechanisms are being year after year judged as “low priority research”. With such low priority recommendations, received year after year, it is no wonder that the funding agencies are reluctant to fund such research.

From the point of view of the safety of mobile phone users, the issue of induction of biological (and possibly health) effects by thermal or non-thermal mechanisms should be put to rest. Continuous talk of the harmlessness of thermal effects induced by temperature rise up to 1 deg. C and the continuous dispute whether non-thermal effects exist is misdirecting science and is taking attention from the important issue – if there are any effects induced by mobile phone radiation at levels permitted by the present safety standards that can alter normal physiology.

Finally, I have discussed only the problem of thermal and non-thermal effects of mobile phone radiation. I did not discuss the possibility that not only specific absorption rate might be important but also the frequency and the modulation of the radiation might be of importance. But this is topic for another blog…

PS
Please, post your comments below. They are important part of the open discussion. I will do my best to respond ASAP. Additionally, your comments provide me with ideas for the future blogs.

PPS
The next blog will present highlights form the BioEM2009 – the Joint Meeting of the Bioelectromagnetics Society (BEMS) and the European BioElectromagnetics Association (EBEA) that will take place in Davos, Switzerland, June 15-19, 2009 (http://bioem2009.org/). Together with Prof. Guglielmo D’Inzeo I have been in charge of the preparation of the scientific program for this largest gathering of scientists in bioelectromagnetics, happening only every four years, and I am expecting for some exciting discussions there.

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This are copy/pasted 21 comments that were received by this blog between June 8th and June 19th, while the blog was displayed on http://www.stuk.fi/
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08.06.2009; 15:55
Joe Morrissey

Dariuz – certainly the regulation of temperature in the body is very complex. It is interesting that Alzheimer’s disease is very likely the result of many complex genetic and environmental factors, although the role of temperature and the hypothalamic set-point governing resting temperature (which can range from 36.1 – 37.7 deg. C) is largely unknown. During aging and beginning in the mid-adult years, there is a gradual and well documented deterioration in ability to maintain core temperature as well as normal circadian oscillations. One recent study reported that AD patients had core body temperatures that were on average 0.1 deg. C higher than in healthy elderly subjects, and that this temperature elevation may correlate with increased levels that are involved in both hypothalamic IL-1, IL-6, and TGF- thermoregulatory control and the inflammatory process associated with the disease. However, humans experience “normal” body temperature fluctuations up to 39-40 deg. C that can be influenced by strenuous exercise, and the literature supports a neuroprotective role. It is intriguing that the average resting temperature for adult women (36.9 deg. C) is slightly warmer than in men (36.7 deg. C) and AD is slightly more common in women. A study of State-by-State prevalence of AD reported the highest proportion of the disease in persons > 85 (46%) in the US was in Iowa, Kansas, and North Dakota – regions where perhaps higher basal metabolic activity may be required to maintain normal thermoregulation. There is some limited evidence in rat models that ischemia coupled with mild hyperthermia treatment (resulting in core body temperatures of 38.5-40 deg. C) can result in AD-like pathology, although the rat hippocampus routinely achieves such temperatures during exploratory activity without apparent adverse effects.

I personally am not convinced that the science demonstrates significant adverse effects of local transient temperature elevations of less than 1 deg. C. However, the body can certainly be responsive to small temperature changes in specialized cells while seemingly resistant to much larger global temperature elevations, and that is very interesting.
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08.06.2009; 18:56
Dariusz Leszczynski

Joe, unfortunately, we are talking about two different issues. You are discussing the implications of the whole-body temperature increase that is caused by the normal physiological fluctuations, or by exercise or by various pathological processes. This is a macro-scale change that does not happen fast and is preceded by e.g. hormonal or cytokine warnings. I am talking about the micro-scale (sub-cellular-scale) changes in temperature that could happen instantaneously and are not preceded by any physiological warning signals. I am asking about the possibility of induction of thermal hot spots on sub-cellular-scale that might induce damage to cellular organelles but that would not be detected when examining temperature on macro-scale.
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08.06.2009; 19:15
Frank Barnes

Hi Dariusz,
The reason the NRC report did not make the study of mechanism a high priority was the expected time scale for the FDA to react. Our concern was making recommendations that we thought they might be able to carry out and we were aware of the fact that they were changing personal and their need to show health effects if any on a short time scale.

My own personal view is that we will not make much progress on this issue until we can go from the physics through the chemistry to the biology.

First I think we need to view temperature as a convenient way to describe a population distribution function. Second I believe that we need to consider the fact that small periodic temperature variations lead to periodic variations in chemical reaction rates that can be amplified by a verity of biological processes. Third changes in temperature can be proportional to the power in put or the electric field squared so that thermal processes can rectify or demodulate RF signal if the biological material has a thermal time constant that lies between the RF carrier frequency and the modulation frequency. Four different chemical processes have different time constants and temperature changes at different rates will lead to different results.
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09.06.2009; 11:02
Dariusz Leszczynski

Frank,
I agree that the effects of temperature increase on the chemical reactions should be studied more. Thermal activation of chemical reactions within the cell, when happening at the wrong time and/or place, may also disrupt the normal physiology. We do not know enough about this subject.
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09.06.2009; 12:26
Phillip Watts

Hello Dariusz
I am a trustee for http://www.es-uk.org/info I am also an Electrical engineer, in my opinion the problem with Cell Towers and Cell phones is the high Electric field strength, in some cases 6v/mtr, we are dealing with a technology that is magnetic by nature, when the electric field strength is higher than a few millivolts, you have the potential to do work at a cellular level, this in turn causes chemical changes at a cellular level, which is why multiple chemical sensitivity, and Electro hypersensitivity have very similar effects on humans and animals.
best Wishes
Phillip Watts
Trustee ES-UK
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09.06.2009; 20:48
Oram Miller

Dariusz,
Thank you for your work and for urging researchers to look further into the effects of low-frequency, low- and non-thermal information carrying radio waves.

I am a building biologist in the US and had the honor of hearing Dr. George Carlo, MD, PhD give a talk at our annual conference in April 2008. He led the multi-year $25 million study for the cell phone industry in the 1990s showing there was indeed a link between cell phone use and human health.

Dr. Carlo discussed the issue of low-frequency information radio waves in great detail at our conference. He stated that the cilia on cell surfaces monitors the cell’s environment, and causes the lipids and proteins that make up the membrane to clamp down from a parasympathetic to a sympathetic mode when the cell comes in contact with a percieved harmful influence. When the influence is found to be benign, the membrane opens up again.

Cells do this several times a minute, Dr. Carlo said, but in the presence of EMFs, including these low-frequency radio waves, membranes stay locked down. When that happens longer than 30-45 seconds, he said the cell either goes into apoptosis (programmed cell suicide) if the cell is more than half its age, or early mitosis (cell division) if the cell is less than half its age. The problem is, the relaxed state of the membrane in the daughter cells becomes the locked down, sympathetic state.

As a result, nutrients do not get in and waste products do not get out. This causes what he called “membrane sensitivity syndrome.” When enough cells in the tissues on the side of the head where cell phones are used experience this syndrome and also lyse through apoptosis, the tissues experience dysfunction.

Furthermore, when cell walls lyse through apoptosis, spewing cytoplasmic contents into the surrounding interstitial fluid, this releases free radicals that were safely encapsulated in the cytoplasm. These free radicals, that are now free in the interstitial fluid, agglutinate and clone themselves, leading to tumorogenesis. This, Dr. Carlo, speculated, could be a reason why cell phone users get tumors at exposure levels well below the SAR.

I believe the low-frequency, non-thermal information carrying radio waves are the holy grail in terms of discovering why cell phones are so harmful. Dr. Carlo said the military knew of a technology that could have broadcast a frequency that would have cancelled the low-frequency radio wave, and that could be done today. Just as with the conversion of analog to digital TV this week in the US, however, every cell phone and tower transmitter would have to be replaced, but it could be done.

In the meantime, he recommended holding the phone at least beyond the near field from the onboard antenna, which is 5 1/2 wavelengths (about 7-8 inches, if I am not mistaken). That means holding the phone arm’s length away. Use the speaker phone option. Air tube earphones are also helpful. If a straight wired earphone is used, you can attach two ferrite beads, one at the bottom and another 3/4 of the way up to capture frequencies picked up and transmitted up the wire to your head by resonance from the antenna to the earphone wire.

I also use a rooftop antenna on my car that disables the onboard antenna within the cell phone when it is plugged in.

Thanks again for your work. I wanted to bring this information from Dr. Carlo to your attention, since he worked in the same field and made a significant contribution.
Oram Miller, BBEI
http://www.createhealthyhomes.com
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09.06.2009; 21:04
Oram Miller

Dariusz,
PS: Dr. Carlo also stated that “Membrane Sensitivity Syndrome” disrupts normal cellular m-RNA processes. Micronuclei are created, altering DNA in the nucleus and mitochondria.

This leads to a whole host of ailments, including cognitive impairment, dementia, and chemical sensitivities, besides cancer.

He also stated that cancer normally takes 15-20 years to develop, but that cell phone use was shortening that to ten years. Studies released up to a year or two ago had subjects using cell phones for less than ten years, and the results were equivocal. Newer studies, however, where subjects uses cell phones ten years and longer, are showing the correlation, he reported.
Thanks again.
Oram Miller, BBEI
http://www.createhealthyhomes.com
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09.06.2009; 22:15
Michael Heiming

Dear professor Leszczynski,
thanks for your article. I don’t know if you know about the research of Prof. Dr. Markus Antonietti, he is the head of the German Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces. (http://www.mpikg.mpg.de/). He found with experiments temperature rises of about 100 C inside brain synapses, from mobile phone radiation!

More info:
http://nurtext.zeit.de/zeit-wissen/2006/05/Handy-Strahlung.xml (German, use translate.google.com or so, if needed)

Perhaps you can get in touch with him, if you are unaware about his findings?
Thanks again
Michael Heiming
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10.06.2009; 17:02
Dariusz Leszczynski

Dear Michael Heiming,
I have contacted Prof Antonietti but he did not confirm the information that you presented in your comment. He wrote “This statement is not true: thermal conduction is too high to allow such temperature gradients. We found along interfaces adsorption rates which are about 1000 lines higher, but this does not transfer into temperatures.”
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10.06.2009; 20:12
Mikko Ahonen

Good that you emphasised hot-spots, Dariusz.

R.J.Spiegel wrote in 1984: ”localized temperatures above 41,6 Degrees C cause protein denaturation, increased permeability of cell membranes, or the liberation of toxins in the location where the hot-spots exists. The severity of the resultant physiologic effect produced by localized temperature increases can be expected to be worsened in critical organs, such as the brain” ,

Additionally, he commented:

“localized SAR distributions produced by the antennas are much different than those generated by plane-wave fields”

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?arnumber=1132767

So, the whole body average SAR is not necessarily a proper dosimetric measure.

To Joe Morrissey: Isn’t high levels of amyloid beta (one) reason for Alzheimer’s disease? If I have understood correctly, the leakage of blood-brain barrier (BBB) by EMFs may increase amyloid beta in brain cells? Above mentioned hot-spot may be critical with BBB leakage. Related information: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19278839 , http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18990717 , http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18044737, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19427372 .

I agree with you Dariusz that the “Thermo Talk” has misled science (and decision makers). BTW, does the gel for SAR-measurements in artificial heads really represent properly a human skull and (natural) electro-magnetic activity in the brain?!
BR, Mikko.

P.S. My home town, Tampere, is famous for winter saunas. When the temperature in the lake is +1 degrees C and in the sauna occasionally +100 degrees C, so, should those cold-hot-enthusiasts suffer from many illnesses? On the contrary: they are the healthiest part of population 😉 So, I am eagerly waiting Dariusz your next biological effects and frequency windows 🙂
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10.06.2009 klo 22:38
Michael Heiming

Dear professor Leszczynski,
thanks for taking the time. It seems Prof. Dr. Markus Antonietti got under quite some pressure after this statement, which had been in several newspapers in Germany?

Mrs. Moser (Swiss health official) who will be also at the upcoming meeting in Davos, told us during a meeting about WiFi at EPUL (Lausanne), she couldn’t do much if anything about peoples health if it is against the mobile phone industry.

However, you might be interested in this study:

“Mechanism of short-term ERK activation by electromagnetic fields at mobile phone frequencies.
Friedman J, Kraus S, Hauptman Y, Schiff Y, Seger R.

Department of Biological Regulation, The Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel.”

It shows for the first time a working mechanism for athermic microwave exposure and can be found at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ searching for “17456048[uid]”.
Thanks and keep up the good work, we count on you!
Michael Heiming
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11.06.2009; 00:39
Gill Lyden

From gillarrow@hotmail.com
http://d.scribd.com/docs/3zkxbnqo25hwwnvgmqm.pdf

Dear Dariusz,
Dr George Carlo, who was given millions of dollars by the phone companies in to carry out presale tests on cellphones (Late 1990s early 2000s) employed 200 international scientist to repeat the tests and without exception, Carlo and the scientists proved that the cellphones were dangerous. The phone companies refused to accept the findings and would not allow publication of the findings.

I saw Carlo speak at Westminster. He explained the mechanism whereby our bodies are harmed by microwave emissions. ( until recently, I did not understand that all the different names were merely more aspects of microwaves, including radar; EMR; ELF;Wi-Fi; WiMax etc. -the 2 last are the worst of all!)
The pulse-modulated microwave beams, which carry information, make contact with individual cells. Each cell affected senses the danger of these unnatural emissions, and forms a protective inmpermeable membrane. Once this is complete, the cell is no longer able to communicate with its fellow cells. However, it still lives! Each cell affected carries on ‘doing its own thing’! This to me, is a perfect explanation for teh clusters of cancer cases found around mobile phone masts – and for the recent increase in gliomas and lymphomas.

Another explanation for development of cancer, was found during epidemiological tests in Schwarzenberg, Switzerland in the late 1990s, where it was proved that switching on the Transmitter which had made people ill for many years, inhibited a hormone called melatonin. This should take over from seratonin-( (a hormone which keeps us awake during the day) at night, and put us to sleep. If melatonin is decreased, we cannot go to sleep! Insomnia is the first and major symptom to be noted in association with the intrusion of micrwave beams into our homes. The other functions of Melatonon are 2) To trigger T-cells to kill off mutated cells – without melatonin, this does not happen and MUTATED CELLS GO ON MUTATING! Another explanation for cancer clusters! and 3)to destroy free radicals, which otherwise cause premature aging! (See:EMR reduces Melatonin in Animals and People by Dr Neil Cherry).
There is an expert on microwaves and human physiology in England named Barrie Trower who worked with microwaves during the last war. I enclose a letter he wrote to the Police Federation plus his address and phone no’ (he does not use a computer)in case you wish to ask him for information. +YOu can find his Report on Tetra for the POlice Federation on the internet. I hope you find this useful.(Barrie was the person who explained to me about microwaves). I could also send you my history of the Orange mast effects in my village if you would like it – before this mast arrive in 2001, I was addicted to my mobile phone and wondered what on earth could be wrong with a phone mast!
(this extremely long comment was truncated by Dariusz Leszczynski)
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11.06.2009; 11:47
Sibylle Gabriel

Dear professor Leszczynski,
thank you for trying to understand what is going on.
to understand what is going on this excellent book may be helpful.
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/rnbwwrm.php
This article is also helpful.
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/gaia.php
It will take quite a time to make the world accept that we are not functioning as thought until know.
You could come in touch with professor Olle Johansson and with Matti Pitkänen.
I hope you can convince the others in Davos, the problem is much more complex as thermal or not thermal, it concerns our DNA and our consciousness.
Kind regards
Sibylle Gabriel
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11.06.2009; 19:22
Jacek Niemczyk

My post is not directly tie to the lively discussion on this blog. I am keen to get information on the research done and/or data sources that cover the exposure to the pulsed low frequency RF: VLF (5KHz) and HF (250 KHz). The said exposure is not widespread – only about 100000 employees are affected by this low power, low RF emitting device – but exposure is 7 hours a day , 250 days a year. device is worn on the employee’s belt , very close to the body. Since the 5 KHz falls under 100Khz, and I quote: ” At frequencies below about 100 kHz, electric fields and currents are induced in the body by time-varying external magnetic fields”… and later on in the same ” Induced electric fields in the body may lead to a variation of membrane potentials at the cellular level. Electric excitation of the membrane might be the result of such membrane potential changes” . Could anyone comment on this matter?
Thank you
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12.06.2009; 17:15
Sibylle Gabriel

Hi, where are the comments from yesterday
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12.06.2009; 19:11
Dariusz Leszczynski

Because today new design of STUK website was implemented, there are some technical problems and blog or comments pla “hide and seek” game. Things will normalize next week. Sorry for the confusion.
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12.06.2009; 21:59
Michael Heiming

Dear Prof. Leszczynski,
thanks for taking the time. I saved my last comment and repost it now.

It seems Prof. Dr. Markus Antonietti got under quite some
pressure after this statement, which had been in several newspapers in Germany?
Mrs. Moser (Swiss health official) who will be also at the upcoming meeting in Davos, told us during a meeting about WiFi at EPUL (Lausanne), she couldn’t do much if anything about peoples health if it is against the mobile phone industry.

However, you might be interested in this study: “Mechanism of shortterm
ERK activation by electromagnetic fields at mobile phone frequencies.
Friedman J, Kraus S, Hauptman Y, Schiff Y, Seger R.
Department of Biological Regulation, The Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel.”

It shows for the first time a working mechanism for athermic microwave exposure and can be found if you don’t know it already at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ searching for “17456048[uid]”.
Thanks and keep up the good work, we count on you!
Michael Heiming
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18.06.2009; 10:05
Karl Muller

Dariusz, I would like to ask you specifically about the evidence regarding pulsed cellphone radiation affecting brainwaves.

Ross Adey working at the Brain Research Institute of the University of California found (decades ago) that brainwaves were affected at extremely low levels of pulsed microwave radiation. Apparently this was seen at levels down to one billionth of a microwatt per sq cm:
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=21038

Be that as it may, there is no doubt that using an ordinary cellphone affects brainwaves:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=mind-control-by-cell

Even the World Health Organisation concedes that cellphone radiation affects brainwaves and reaction times, but it says this is “not a proven health risk”.

I maintain that ANYTHING that affects the normal functioning of my brain is automatically a PROVEN health risk — to the most vital organ in the human body.

GSM cellphone radiation is pulsed at just over 8Hz. This entrains brainwaves into a “low alpha” state, which corresponds to a kind of sleep/trance state. If one is trying to function consciously, and carrying out important tasks, how can this be anything other than a health risk?

Since brainwaves are “electrochemical” in nature, surely having a pulsed microwave transmitter put right against the head, is bound to have effects on the brain. Because we are talking about electromagnetic systems entraining one another, this is not a “thermal” effect, but a purely biological one, following from using biologically active frequencies to pulse microwave carrier waves.

When I spoke with you when you were in South Africa, you confirmed that a warning is given in Europe not to expose the brain to cellphone radiation for more than 15 minutes at a time. No such warning is ever given to citizens here in South Africa, who routinely speak literally for hours on end on cellphones.

Since the arrival of cellphones, we have had an epidemic of Attention Deficit Disorder in schoolchildren, with entire classes in ordinary state schools being lined up and dosed with Ritalin — we are talking about *every single child* in a class.

I did research on language and “attention” in schools in South Africa in the 1980s. In 17 years of working in black education here, I can honestly say that I did not encounter one single case of what might even remotely be called ADD. Now I find that it is pandemic across our schools.

Somewhere along the line, scientists must take a serious look at the *visible* changes which are happening in society, and try correlate them with the mass irradiation of the entire population with pulsed microwaves.

Incidentally, Ross Adey also found calcium intake to cells was affected at a 16Hz pulse rate. Is the 8Hz pulse rate used by cellphones not going to have a 16Hz harmonic, and is this also surely going to affect calcium uptake in cells, particularly in the brain?
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18.06.2009; 12:26
Sibylle Gabriel

The book the rainbow and the worm written by Mae-Wan Ho is very helpful to understand what is going on with energy input in our organism. You will found a chapter (13) on the sensitivity to weak electromagnetic fields.
Hope you will like this very important book as I do
Kind regards
SiBYLLE Gabriel
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18.06.2009; 14:30
Anna
What about Microwave Sickness in East Europe? Isn’t it the proof of non-thermal effects?
Best,
electosensitive from Poland
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19.06.2009; 23:50
Sibylle Gabriel

Have a look at the excellent side of Dr. Andrew Marino
http://www.andrewamarino.com