Effects of the exposure to intermittent 1.8 GHz radio frequency electromagnetic fields on HSP70 expression and MAPK signaling pathways in PC12 cells.
Valbonesi P, Franzellitti S, Bersani F, Contin A, Fabbri E. · 2014
View Original AbstractSpecific cell phone signal patterns trigger cellular stress responses at regulatory limits, suggesting current safety standards miss critical biological effects.
Plain English Summary
Italian scientists exposed nerve cells to cell phone radiation at twice safety limits for 24 hours. Only specific GSM signal patterns triggered cellular stress responses, while other signal types had no effect. This suggests the way phone signals are structured affects biological impact.
Why This Matters
This study adds important nuance to our understanding of how cell phone radiation affects living cells. The researchers used a SAR level of 2 W/kg, which is at the current regulatory limit and represents heavy phone use held directly against the head. What makes this research particularly significant is that it demonstrates how signal modulation patterns matter for biological effects. The fact that only the GSM-217Hz signal triggered cellular stress responses while other patterns did not suggests that the specific characteristics of wireless signals, not just their power levels, influence biological impact. This finding aligns with growing evidence that current safety standards, which focus only on heating effects and ignore signal modulation, may be inadequate. The researchers' confirmation of their earlier findings in human cells strengthens the case that these are reproducible biological responses, not random laboratory artifacts.
Exposure Details
- SAR
- 2 W/kg
- Exposure Duration
- 4, 16 or 24 h to 1.8 GHz
Exposure Context
This study used 2 W/kg for SAR (device absorption):
- 5x above the Building Biology guideline of 0.4 W/kg
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
In the present work the same experimental conditions were applied to the rat PC12 cells, in order to assess the stress responses mediated by HSP70 and by the Mitogen Activated Protein Kinases (MAPK) in neuronal-like cells, an interesting model to study possible effects of mobile phone frequencies exposure.
HSP70 gene expression level was evaluated by reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction, HSP70 ...
After PC12 cells exposure to the GSM-217Hz signal for 16 or 24 h, HSP70 transcription significantly ...
The positive effect on HSP70 mRNA expression, observed only in cells exposed to the GSM-217Hz signal, is a repeatable response previously reported in human trophoblast cells and now confirmed in PC12 cells. Further investigations towards a possible role of 1.8 GHz signal modulation are therefore advisable.
Show BibTeX
@article{p_2014_effects_of_the_exposure_1396,
author = {Valbonesi P and Franzellitti S and Bersani F and Contin A and Fabbri E.},
title = {Effects of the exposure to intermittent 1.8 GHz radio frequency electromagnetic fields on HSP70 expression and MAPK signaling pathways in PC12 cells.},
year = {2014},
url = {https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24512569/},
}