Effects of long-term exposure to 900 megahertz electromagnetic field on heart morphology and biochemistry of male adolescent rats.
Kerimoğlu G, Mercantepe T, Erol HS, Turgut A, Kaya H, Çolakoğlu S, Odacı E. · 2016
View Original AbstractDaily cell phone-level EMF exposure during adolescence caused lasting heart damage in rats, including oxidative stress and muscle cell death.
Plain English Summary
Researchers exposed adolescent male rats to cell phone-level radiation (900 MHz) for one hour daily during their development and examined their hearts as adults. The exposed rats showed significant heart damage including increased oxidative stress, structural changes to heart muscle cells, and higher rates of cell death compared to unexposed controls. This suggests that EMF exposure during critical developmental periods may cause lasting cardiovascular damage.
Why This Matters
This study adds important evidence to growing concerns about EMF exposure during development, when tissues are most vulnerable to damage. The 900 MHz frequency and exposure levels used here mirror typical cell phone emissions, making these findings directly relevant to human exposure scenarios. What's particularly concerning is that the damage occurred from just one hour of daily exposure during adolescence, yet persisted into adulthood. The cardiovascular system effects observed include oxidative stress and structural damage to heart muscle cells - the same mechanisms implicated in heart disease. This research reinforces why precautionary measures are especially important for children and adolescents, whose developing bodies may be accumulating damage that won't manifest as health problems until later in life.
Exposure Details
- SAR
- 0.0093 W/kg
- Power Density
- 0.0187 µW/m²
- Electric Field
- 5.4, 7, 8.4, 9.54 V/m
- Source/Device
- 900 MHz
- Exposure Duration
- 1 h/day between postnatal days 21 and 59
Exposure Context
This study used 0.0187 µW/m² for radio frequency:
- 1.9Mx above the Building Biology guideline of 0.1 μW/m²
- 31.2Kx above the BioInitiative Report recommendation of 0.0006 μW/cm²
This study used 5.4, 7, 8.4, 9.54 V/m for electric fields:
- 18x above the Building Biology guideline of 0.3 V/m
Building Biology guidelines are practitioner-based limits from real-world assessments. BioInitiative Report recommendations are based on peer-reviewed science. Check Your Exposure to compare your own measurements.
Where This Falls on the Concern Scale
Study Details
We investigated the effects of exposure to 900 MHz EMF during adolescence on male adult rats
Twenty-four 21-day-old male rats were divided into three equal groups: control (Cont-Gr), sham (Shm-...
Biochemical analysis showed increased levels of malondialdehyde and superoxide dismutase, and reduce...
We found that exposure of male rats to 900 MHz EMF for 1 h/day during adolescence caused oxidative stress, which caused structural alteration of male adolescent rat heart tissue.
Show BibTeX
@article{g_2016_effects_of_longterm_exposure_536,
author = {Kerimoğlu G and Mercantepe T and Erol HS and Turgut A and Kaya H and Çolakoğlu S and Odacı E.},
title = {Effects of long-term exposure to 900 megahertz electromagnetic field on heart morphology and biochemistry of male adolescent rats.},
year = {2016},
doi = {10.1080/10520295.2016.1216165},
url = {https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10520295.2016.1216165},
}