According to Daily Dot, five ninth-grade girls in Denmark, "noticed they had trouble concentrating after sleeping with their mobile phones at their bedsides. They tried to figure out why. The school obviously doesn't have the equipment to test human brain waves, so the girls decided to do a more rudimentary experiment.
They placed six trays of garden cress seeds next to Wi-Fi routers that emitted roughly the same microwave radiation as a mobile phone. Then they placed six more trays of seeds in a separate room without routers. The girls controlled both environments for room temperature, sunlight and water.
After 12 days, they found the garden cress seeds in the routerless room had exploded into bushy greenery, while the seeds next to the Wi-Fi routers were brown, shriveled, and even mutated".
As a medical student, I know well that all electromagnetic radiation may cause some detrimental effects. No doubt, this is true for non-ionizing radiations such as microwave radiation emitted from Wi-Fi routers. In spite of this, I cannot trust this non-peer reviewed report because I live in an apartment, and when I turn my laptop on, many Wi-Fi sources (Wi-Fi accounts of my neighbors) are detectable. By the way, if the findings of the Danish students were true, no plant could have grown in our apartment, while there are in fact a wide variety of houseplants in our apartment.
Source:
http://www.dailydot.com/lifestyle/wireless-router-wi-fi-plants/#
The essential (but omitted) follow-up control experiment would be to move the wifi router to the other room to see if it killed the cress there. They need to control also for air movement.
Wifi routers and cell phones work differently. Neither emit microwaves. Some cell phones go beep when fully charged, or when being scanned for, which can in fact cause a disturbed sleep, leading to lack of concentration.
WiFi routers and mobile phones do emit microwaves.
WiFi operates in the 2.45GHz band, the same frequency band used for microwave ovens (and, Bluetooth, cordless phones, toy remote controls) , or the 5.80GHz band (in North America 915MHz may also be used). Mobile phone GSM bands range from 380MHz to 2GHz. The lowest frequency GSM bands fall at the bottom end of the microwave frequency spectrum.
In Europe, mobile phones use the GSM-900 and GSM-1800 bands (900 and 1800MHz), so the WiFi routers used in the experiment would be at a higher frequency than mobile phones (2.45 or 5.80GHz - the 915MHz range not available in Europe).
However the experiment's conclusions might be a wee bit off, the experiment seem to be very correct. They confirmed that plants have troublesome germination nearby a WiFi router. While it is true that routers emit microwaves, they also emit heat, and some also sound/vibrations, and some produce jets of air. These aspects are seldom tackled, even when they are irritatingly obvious. Routers devour ~2US$ electricity per month and no one seem to notice it.
Mobile phones are also quite noisy, even when they are not. Location update and other periodic actions tend to produce noises that are otherwise not noticed, but in the quiet of the night ... they are noisy.
So why not :)
Microwave as a double-edged sword!
Microwave radiation, like gamma rays, x-rays and UV is a double-edged sword. Although it can cause some detrimental effects (thermal and non-thermal effects), it has some beneficial / stimulatory effects. If you are interested in this issue, please check the following link:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2251729413000244
Electricity and its related phenomena follow coherent principles that essentially give credence to these "double-edge" observations of interactions between forced fields in systems (ssrn.com/abstract=437181). It is therefore necessary for such principles to inform the experiments leading to these observations and/or recommendations. In this vein, it is suitable to appropriate these experiments, using the light of these principles, for a better understanding of the obtained results, etc.
Radiations of mobile phone certainly affect human skull and disrupts concentration, and increases Seriously in an incoming call.Practically, we must avoid contact gsm more than 15 minutes, and use the left ear or use headphones.
Definitely the experiment is correct. Yes one can get beeter validation of data by taking larger samples. But in this case it sees that larger amount of grainsitself. can act as larger samples.
Regarding the effect you can notice the effect significantly in germinatin seeds as the cell dicision is fast. The cell divison and growth, basically biochemical reactin of radiacals, is significantly affected by the environment. be it temprature, presure or any thing. During the exposure to radiation , here typically microwave range, rather than deposiing energy (in the form of rise in temperature) it induced oscilation of dipole moment of the molecules and hence divert the nature of the proposed metabolic reaction This induce mutation. All of them can effect the functining of brain.
Further, for children tehir cells are tender, growing and mulitplying state, and hence more sensitive to radiation or any other environment.
The effect of ionising radiation is entirely different where the energy of the radiation is suufincent enugh to reat ion pairs and radicals whcih wil severly affect the metabolic function. Please refer any article on radiology or radiation therapy
I'd need to see this experiment independently verified before I'd believe it. In my opinion, an effect so dramatic would not have gone unnoticed by now, only waiting to be discovered by a bunch of school kids. I do believe microwave radiation has adverse effects, but the effects are more subtle, and one would need a large statistics to be able to pinpoint the effects. A five-year Swiss study on the effects of microwave radiation on vegetation was not sufficient to demonstrate these effects (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0048-9697(95)04918-5). It would be interesting to see a large-scale study on the effects to microwave radiation exposure, though, something akin to Doll & Hill's study on tobacco smoking (http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.2.5001.1071 and http://dx.doi.org/10.1136%2Fbmj.38142.554479.AE).
yes, definitely before making a conclusive remarks we definitely need more statistics. Presenclty we can give qualitative remarks only.
Science should be made by scientists with protocols. review equipment. Not for amateurs who say they have done this or that. Radiation from cell was placed in the group of cancer risk in the same level of coffee. the internet is full of amateur scientists (seen amateur phisician) talking nonsense. good news does not sell newspaper. is required to be bad news to sell newspapers. hundreds of millions of people use wi-fi in the world there is no record of diseases caused by them.
@Musthafa: If you want to get clearer and unambiguous results, you have not only to enlarge the number of your probes, you have above all to determine all boundary conditions. For plants this could be kind of seeds, light, temperature, soil, fertilizer, climate, air streams etc.
I´m really astonished about the cited effects, since I´m following the discussions since many years and I never read a serious clear result like you´ve cited it.
Of course I know the thermic effects, but these effects are not discussed here.
@Wagner de Souza Pereira
I disagree. Clearly science informing government policy and the like should be the highest quality.
But, Science needs to be done by as many people as possible. If we want to avoid being some infallible priesthood making pronouncements that are not open to discussion or disagreement (and, I for one don't want that) then as many people as possible need to be equipped to join the discussion. Especially in areas of public health, such as whether EM radiation (whether that be mobile phones, wi-fi or HV transmission lines) is harmful. How are people to be able to engage in such discussion if we say they're not entitled to undertake the most fundamental of scientific endeavours, to run experiments. The first thing people need to engage with science is an understanding of the nature of the scientific method, and the best way to understand something is by doing.
It is vitally important for society that people experiment, that they learn the scientific method by doing it. Most especially that's true for school children. OK, so the ninth graders in the opening story didn't control all variables, they had too small a sample, and could have done better. But, they did a great job, even some professional scientists don't do as well (I'm sure we've all been sent some total garbage submitted to a journal for review). And, though the science itself wasn't perfect (I'd have pointed out several flaws if sent a paper for review based on that work) they well deserved the prize they got for noticing a phenomenon, forming a hypothesis and an experiment to test it. They may not go onto become professional scientists, but they will grow up to become citizens better informed than many on the nature of the scientific method, and hence better placed to intelligently assess a range of scientific studies.
I certainly seen some bad science in the last 10 years or so. From my point of view, the experiment here was conducted properly. Maybe the conclusions are a wincy bit of a stretch, but in many points worth the effort. It may be opposite from what you'd expect from a big lab, but it has a charm of independent study and thinking on their own.
I'd also distance myself from the bandwagon fallacy of "no record in the world" of any disease. First because not long ago WiFi was not used so close to one's body, but smartphones brought it directly to our skin. And secondly, I know a procedure of RF field measurements, SAR in tissue, and it is never that much dismissive, yet the conclusions usually are. It is not that I expect any damaging effects - I don't, but dismissing it altogether on anecdotal basis is not helping. It makes people suspicious.
People are scared of everything with an antenna, ants included. They are not just suddenly going to become brave by being written off as irrelevant or ignorant, they'll become agitated. They are very relevant when you need to put any radio equipment in their vicinity, and they say no. They'll keep saying no until we can come up with real assessments of all risks involved with intention of placing people's perspective on their true risks.
For example, I'll have to convince a school principal that my small telemetry device that transmits a short burst of 10mW every 10s and depletes a small battery in 15 years - is not harmful for children. I may pitch some spin and make her feel stupid, but I'd rather stick to the facts and make sure she trusts me.
Anyway, I can sense my IQ drop 10 points each time someone blatantly dismisses health effects of RF fields on the basis "because I say so". 20 points when some screamingly dismissive study comes about. It only makes my life more difficult.
What is science means trying to understand the system in the nature. Systematic experiments in controlled conditions, (the scientific methods) is the method to undestand the science of natural phenomina. When some thing unexpected is noticed it will stimulate the thinking proess and logics. You want to verify the logic. Do sstematic experiments and observations. This come form the inner consciousness. This is the budding of a scientist. Matures scientist are expected to have better inclination toward right perspections. Therefore we sholdnot blindy discard any observations. We should see the logic and descrepancies and try to evolve a better result through a much more systematic way
Mobile Phones are tested for Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) by the Body. However the testing is very controlled. Ie the Phone will be radiating away from the body and held x cm from the body. Read the phone manual and you will see guides on use which are there to ensure that the phone meets the standard (I bet you don't use the phone like the manual says).
WiFi routers are not tested for SAR's because it is assumed that people will be more that 20cm (one of the limits for this test) from the device on a regular bases.
The main point is that the public do not use these devices as intended and so will be exposed to rates above what is thought to be safe.
In the girls case is suspect it would be related to sleep deprivation not RF radiation.
Ether way the solution is not to sleep with a phone (or electronics) next to you (or in the same room).
Davor, apologies for taking this long to reply your kind suggestion that I check the link that I provided (http://www.ssrn.com/abstract=437181).
I have checked it and suggest that you kindly cut and paste it or use it directly (as one of the links provided)..In addition, the link points to a paper which sets the stage for the effects of radiation to be readily studied. It underscores the link between winds and waves, which is at the heart of the unification of the forces of nature.
A related link shows a follow up paper on how an industry may combat forces, which appear to be harmless exchanges among groups of agents but may end up being harmful to the industry (as well as to the agents). The paper essentially shows the possible transformation of non-ionizing radiations into ionizing radiations.
The basic fact about electromagnetic waves is that they would remain invaluable in the plan of humanity to mind, mine, and mint the wind of change.
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=437181
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2637460
OK, that is something a bit different. I'm printing the paper for later. Some concepts need my undivided attention. Thanks
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