Radiation literature survey

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This is a case-control study that looked into the association between childhood leukaemia and exposure to ELF-MF. A total of 745 cases were matched to 1475 controls. The ELF-MF exposure was determined via measurements in the child’s bedroom. Analyses using arithmetic mean of the magnetic field readings found an odds ratio (OR) of 1.87 (95% CI = 1.04-3.34) for exposure within 0.1-0.2 µT; however the analyses for exposure of more than 0.2 µT did not find a statistically significant OR.

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This in vivo study investigated whether exposure to low level radiofrequency (RF) fields from mobile phones causes adverse health effects. The head region of the rats was exposed to at 900 megahertz (MHz) RF field (frequency used for GSM mobile phones), at power density level of 608 milliwatts per square metre (roughly one tenth of the public exposure limit), for 45 minutes. The authors suggested that a single 45-minute session of low level RF exposure may lead to a retarded learning and a deficit in spatial memory.

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This case-cohort study investigated the association between occupational exposures and Parkinson’s disease (PD). Over 58,000 men and over 62,000 women were followed for over 17 years, resulting in 402 male and 207 female PD deaths. Exposures to pesticides, solvents, metals, diesel motor emissions, electric shocks and extremely low frequency magnetic fields (ELF-MF) were included in the study. Elevated risk was reported for high exposure to ELF-MF (Hazard ratio = 1.54, 95% CI = 1.00-2.36) (the authors do not provide any information on what constitutes a high exposure). The authors conclude that the weight given to these findings is limited by the absence of a trend with either duration or cumulative exposure.

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Few studies have reported on a positive association between occupational exposure to ELF-MF and PD, but it is possible that electric shock is responsible for the association, as has been suggested for other neurodegenerative diseases especially Alzheimer’s disease.

Due to the small number of PD cases studied in this paper, any correlation between ELF-MF exposure and PD cannot be confidently linked. This is because PD is a chronic, but not a fatal disease so there is a strong suggestion that substantial under-reporting of PD on death certificates has occurred. Since the study relies on the information on death certificates to find the cases, under-reporting could reduce the power to detect associations. Limited number of high-exposed cases especially among women is another limitation of this study.

A report by the Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks in 2013 found that there are few new epidemiological studies on neurodegenerative diseases and they did not provide convincing evidence of an increased risk of these diseases related to ELF-MF exposure. Whether exposure to ELF-MF affects the development or progression of neurodegenerative diseases remains unclear and further epidemiological and experimental studies are required.

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This in vivo study investigated the impact of melatonin treatment when exposure to microwave radiation occurs. Rats were exposed to a 900 MHz RF field, 160 volts per metre (roughly 1.5 times the occupational exposure limit), for 4 hours a day, for 20, 40 and 60 days. Rats were divided into four treatment groups (rats not exposed/control, rats treated with melatonin, rats exposed, and rats exposed and treated with melatonin). The treatments were examined for oxidative stress, as it is the key mechanism on how microwave causes tissue injury. Overall, the melatonin treatment led to a decrease in oxidative stress.

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p>This human provocation study investigated the effect of mobile phone on electrical cardiac activity. In the study, the heart rate and electrocardiogram (ECG) of one hundred healthy volunteers were recorded in three situations: without mobile phone, mobile phone switched on but not ringing, and mobile phone ringing (35 minutes). In the latter two conditions, the mobile phone (2G, GSM 900/1800) was placed inside the left pocket-anterior chest wall. There was no statistically significant difference observed in heart rate and ECG. The authors concluded that mobile phones have no significant effect on the measured heart rate and electrical cardiac activity when placed in close proximity to the heart in healthy subjects.

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This is an animal study investigating the long term effects of chronic microwave radiation on cognitive function. Rats were either exposed or sham to 2.856 gigahertz (GHz) microwaves with the average power density level of 5, 10, 20 or 30 milliwatts per square centimetre (mW/cm2) for 6 minutes, three times a week for up to 6 weeks. The authors suggested that in the long-term, chronic microwave exposure could induce dose dependent deficit of spatial learning and memory in rats.

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p>This animal study investigated the effects of exposure to radiofrequency (RF) radiation on the blood-brain barrier (BBB) and cognitive changes in rats. A total of 108 male rats were exposed to RF at 900MHz, 1 mW/cm² or sham for 14 or 28 days (3 hours per day). The specific energy absorption rate (SAR) varied between 0.016 watts per kilogram (W/kg) for the whole body and 2 W/kg locally in the head. The authors found that the 28-day exposure impairs spatial memory and damages BBB permeability in rats.

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This study aimed at validating the mobile phone use history reported by study participants in a large Swedish population-based case-control study that investigated the association between mobile phone use and acoustic neuroma risk. The self-reported start year of mobile phone use was validated from a total of 96 out of 326 cases and 111 out of 505 controls, using the network operator data. About 60% of subjects were able to correctly identify the start year of mobile phone use. The authors concluded that recall bias could not be excluded in this study.

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One of the biggest problems with epidemiological studies investigating the relationship between mobile phone use and tumour risk is the validity of data on self-reported mobile phone use obtained from the study participants. Recall bias is often the cause and as cases over-report and controls under-report their mobile phone use, bias in results may occur and interpretation of results becomes difficult. The INTERPHONE project, which is a large case-control study looking into association between mobile phone use and cancer risks from 13 different countries including Australia, also cites that recall bias is one of the limitations of the study that prevent conclusions of causality being drawn. Interestingly, in this study there was no significant difference between cases and controls in estimating start year.

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The aim of this animal study was to investigate whether exposure to radiofrequency (RF) electromagnetic fields can cause behavioural changes. Mice were exposed to a 2.45 Gigahertz (GHz) RF field at 10-100 milliwatts for 60 min/day, up to 120 days. After the exposure, mice were assessed for anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and depression-like behaviour. The authors concluded that up to 120 days of RF exposure does not cause any behavioural changes in mice.

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This is an animal study that looked into the effect of extremely low frequency (ELF) magnetic fields (MF) on behavioural, hormonal, and metabolic changes in rats. In the study, rats were exposed to a 0.1 mT magnetic field at frequencies of 1 and 5 Hertz (Hz), for a period of up to 21 days. ELF-MF exposure did not alter body weight, or food and water intake. There were different effects observed between the exposure at 1 and 5 Hz on two stress hormones. The exposure at 5 Hz also showed increased activities in dopamine-related behaviour. The authors concluded that the effects of ELF-MF on hormonal and behavioural responses may differ depending on the frequency and time of exposure.

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In animals, the possibility that exposure to ELF fields may affect neurobehavioral function has been explored by a number of different studies and these have been reviewed by the World Health Organization (WHO, 2007). The review by WHO found no consistent effects of ELF fields in stress-related hormones of the pituitary-adrenal axis in mammals, with the possible exception of transient (minutes duration) stress following the onset of ELF electric field exposure at levels significantly above perception thresholds. Furthermore most studies that investigated the effects of ELF fields in hormones involved in controlling metabolic activity found no effect.