Sensitivity of Pigment Content of Banana and Orchid Tissue Culture Exposed to Extremely Low Frequency Electromagnetic Fiel

Natural exposure of extremely low frequency electromagnetic field (ELF-EMF) occurs in the environment and acts as one of the abiotic factors that affect the growth and development of organisms. This study was conducted to determine the effect of ELF-EMF on the tissue cultured banana and slipper orchid chlorophyll content as one of the indicators in measuring plant photosynthetic capacity. Four days old banana (Musa sp. cv. Berangan) corm and seven days old slipper orchid (Paphiopedilum rothschildianum) cultures were exposed to 6 and 12 mT ELF-EMF generated by controllable ELF-EMF built up machine for 0.5, 1, 2 and 4 hours. After exposure, the banana and orchid cultures were incubated at 25° C for 8 and 16 weeks, respectively. The results showed that the ELF-EMF exposure had different effects on banana and slipper orchid cultures though both plant species belong to monocotyledon. The highest increase in chlorophyll content on banana was resulted by the high intensity and long duration of ELF-EMF exposure (12 mT for 4 hours), whereas on slipper orchid the modest and short duration of ELF-EMF exposure produced the most excessive chlorophyll content. Different ELF-EMF exposures (12 mT for 4 hours and 6 mT for 30 minutes) had potential to be applied on each plant to improve in vitro plant (banana and slipper orchid, respectively) growth. The increased chlorophyll and carotene/xanthophyll content on banana indicated that the banana was more tolerant to ELF-EMF exposure compared to slipper orchid

Cytoprotective Effect of 120 Hz Electromagnetic Fields on Early Hepatocarcinogenesis: Experimental and Theoretical Findings

Carcinogenesis induced chemically produces mutations affecting standard cells’ behavior. An electrophilic attack on DNA result as the primary characteristic. Once xenobiotics are administrated to mammals they suffer a metabolic activation in the liver through cytochrome P450 (CYP450) enzymes, converting them to toxic compounds, generating oxidative stress (OS), and bursting electrophiles near the site of oxidation. CYP450 are electron carrier proteins that generate spin-correlated radical pair (RP) intermediaries. An extremely low-frequency electromagnetic field (ELF-EMF) can modulate the spin-flip conversion between singlet and triplet spin states of the RP populations, modifying the product formation during their metabolization. Experimentally, we induce hepatic cancer chemically; we found that ELF-EMF inhibits both the number and area of preneoplastic lesions by more than 50%. Furthermore, theoretically, we develop a quantum mechanical model based on the RP mechanism (RPM) in the Haberkorn approximation to explain the cytoprotective effects of ELF-EMF. Here, we review the status of the action’s mechanism of ELF-EMF on our research on early hepatocarcinogenesis

Growth inhibition of the toxic cyanobacterium Cylindrospermopsis raciborskii by extremely low-frequency electromagnetic fields

This study investigates the effects of extremely low-frequency electromagnetic fields (ELF-EMFs) on the growth and antioxidant defence enzymes of the toxic cyanobacterium Cylindrospermopsis raciborskii (Woloszynska) Seenayya et Subba Raju. To determine resonance frequency of growth inhibition of C. raciborskii, cells were subjected to ELF square amplitude modulated waves (QAMW) with a range of frequencies (0.1, 0.3, 0.5, 0.7, 0.9 Hz) at single intensity of 100 V m–1 for 30 minutes. The results revealed that the highest growth inhibition of Cylindrospermopsis occurred upon exposure to 0.7 Hz QAMW for 30 min. ELF-EMF-exposed cultures exhibited a marked decrease in cell number, chlorophyll-a content and activity of antioxidant enzymes compared to control cultures, and this effect increased with the prolongation of exposure time. Moreover, ELF-EMF induced morphological changes in Cylindrospermopsis cells upon exposure to 0.7 Hz QAMW for 120 min, including shrinking and disintegration of cytoplasmic contents, and thickening of the cell wall. Changes in dielectric properties, as a measure of interaction of cellular constituents (e.g., plasma membrane, cell wall and cytoplasm), with electromagnetic fields were also observed for treated cells. Our results provide a new possibility for using ELF-EMFs to eliminate toxic cyanobacteria from drinking and recreational water sources

The structural and functional effects of electromagnetic fields on the plasma membrane of Vicia faba, the broad bean : a thesis dissertation presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science, Plant Biology at Massey University

Vicia faba (broad bean) root-tip cells were exposed to electromagnetic fields at 50 and 60 Hz, square and sine waveforms and 0.1, 1, and 10 gauss. Levels of [³H]-alanine uptake and ion efflux were measured at these parameters and compared to unexposed control seedlings. The ultrastructure of cortical cells from the zone of elongation exposed to a 1 gauss, 50 hertz, squarewave field was studied under the electron microscope. In the first uptake trials alanine uptake via ATP dependant membrane carriers was stimulated by square waveform fields, but inhibited by 50 Hz fields. In the replicate trials alanine uptake was inhibited by both 50 and 60 hertz, square and sine waveform fields. The different response between trials was attributed to aging of the seeds used, owing to a six month chemical supply delay. This apparent aging of the seeds appeared to increase seedling susceptibility to modification by electromagnetic fields. The ion efflux trials saw no significant change in the pattern of ion efflux (as measured by conductivity) from exposed cells, although there was a significant decrease in hydrogen ion efflux at 0.1 and 1 gauss. A secondary inhibition effect on hydrogen ion efflux occurred with exposure to sine and square waveforms, but only in the presence of 0.1 and 1 gauss field amplitudes. The reduction in hydrogen efflux was most probably due to the inhibition of an active ATP dependent membrane carrier responsible for maintaining the transmembrane electrochemical gradient. Under the electron microscope exposed cortex cells from the zone of elongation had significantly more pinocytotic vesicles than the controls. These vesicles were believed to be involved in bulk uptake of extracellular media, which may permit exposed cells to expand more rapidly than the controls. Thus the functioning of three separate membrane transport systems were shown to be susceptible to functional modification, at least in the short term, by extremely low frequency electromagnetic fields. This introduces the potential for an enormous array of downstream effects to echo through-out the organism via signal transduction pathways