Massive measurements of 5G exposure in a town: methodology and results

We target the problem of performing a large set of measurements over the territory to characterize the exposure from a 5G deployment. Since using a single Spectrum Analyzer (SA) is not practically feasible (due to the limited battery duration), in this work we adopt an integrated approach, based on the massive measurement of 5G metrics with a 5G smartphone, followed by a detailed analysis done with the SA and an ElectroMagnetic Field (EMF) meter in selected locations. Results, obtained over a real territory covered by 5G signal, reveal that 5G exposure is overall very limited for most of measurement locations, both in terms of field strength (up to 0.7 [V/m]) and as share w.r.t. other wireless technologies (typically lower than 15%). Moreover, our approach allows easily spotting measurement outliers, e.g., due to the exploitation of Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS) techniques between 4G and 5G. In addition, the exposure metrics collected with the smartphone are overall a good proxy of the total exposure measured over the whole 5G channel. Moreover, the sight conditions and the distance from 5G base station play a great role in determining the level of exposure. Finally, a maximum of 130 [W] of power radiated by a 5G base station is estimated in the scenario under consideration

How Much Exposure From 5G Towers Is Radiated Over Children, Teenagers, Schools and Hospitals?

The rolling-out of 5G antennas over the territory is a fundamental step to provide 5G connectivity. However, little efforts have been done so far on the exposure assessment from 5G cellular towers over young people and 'sensitive' buildings, like schools and medical centers. To face such issues, we provide a sound methodology for the numerical evaluation of 5G (and pre-5G) downlink exposure over children, teenagers, schools and medical centers. We then apply the proposed methodology over two real scenarios. Results reveal that the exposure from 5G cellular towers will increase in the forthcoming years, in parallel with the growth of the 5G adoption levels. However, the exposure levels are well below the maximum ones defined by international regulations. Moreover, the exposure over children and teenagers is similar to the one of the whole population, while the exposure over schools and medical centers can be lower than the one of the whole set of buildings. Finally, the exposure from 5G is strongly lower than the pre-5G one when the building attenuation is introduced and a maturity adoption level for 5G is assumed

Methodology Based on Vector and Scalar Measurement of Traffic Channel Power Levels to Assess Maximum Exposure to Electromagnetic Radiation Generated by 5G NR Systems

Maximum-Power Extrapolation (MPE) for mobile telecommunication sources follows an established paradigm based on the identification and measurement of a channel that acts as a power reference. Prior to the 5G era, the role of reference channel has been played by always-on broadcast signals since they had the great advantage of being always transmitted at the maximum power level allowed for a generic signal channel. However, the beamforming implemented by 5G sources obliges us to rethink this approach. In fact, with beamforming the 5G source can transmit data traffic streams through a beam characterized by a much higher gain than the broadcast one. This implies that the detected power for traffic beams could be much higher than the corresponding power of broadcast beams. In this paper, a novel approach for 5G MPE procedure is presented, where the direct measurement of the received power of a traffic beam is used to assess the maximum exposure generated by a 5G system. An innovative specific experimental setup is also proposed, with the use of a User Equipment (UE) with the aim of forcing the traffic beam toward the measurement positions. In this way, it is possible to directly measure the power of each Resource Element (RE) transmitted by the traffic beam. As opposed to other MPE proposals for 5G, the discussed technique does not require any correction of the measured data since it relies only on the traffic beam pointing toward the measurement position, simplifying the overall MPE procedure and thus reducing the uncertainty of the MPE estimated field strength

Methyl-CpG binding protein 2 dysfunction provides stress vulnerability with sex- and zygosity-dependent outcomes

Stress vulnerability is a critical factor for the development of trauma-related disorders; however, its biological underpinnings are not clear. We demonstrated that dysfunctions in the X-linked epigenetic factor methyl-CpG binding protein 2 (MeCP2) provide trauma vulnerability in male mice. Given the prominent role of sex in stress outcomes, we explored the effects of MeCP2 hypofunctionality in females. Female mice carrying truncated MeCP2 (heterozygous and homozygous) and wild type controls (wt) were tested for fear memory. Stress-induced corticosterone release and brain expression of hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis regulatory genes were also evaluated in wt and mutant mice of both sexes. Although heterozygous females displayed a normal stress-related behavioural profile, homozygous mice showed enhanced memory recall for the threatening context compared to wt, thus recapitulating the phenotype previously evidenced in hemizygous males. Interestingly, MeCP2 truncation abolished the sex differences in stress-induced corticosterone release, which was found increased in mutant males, whereas blunted in mutant females in a zygosity-independent manner. Although heterozygous mice did not differ from controls, homozygous females and hemizygous males showed increased hypotalamic Crh and Avp mRNAs and a differentially altered expression of Fkbp5 in cortical areas. Present results demonstrate that in female mice carrying truncated MeCP2, altered stress responsivity is driven by homozygosity, whereas heterozygosity does not lead to maladaptive stress outcomes. MeCP2 dysfunctions thus provide stress vulnerability in mice with sex- and zygosity-dependent outcomes

EMF Exposure in 5G Standalone mm-Wave Deployments: What Is the Impact of Downlink Traffic?

The rolling-out of 5G networks is recently including 5G Base Stations (BSs) operating on millimeter-Wave (mm-Wave) frequencies. The goal of this work is to shed light on the exposure assessment from commercial 5G mm-Wave 5G BSs, by focusing on the impact of downlink traffic on the exposure levels. To this aim, we adopt an innovative measurement framework, based on hardware and software components, able to satisfy the challenging measurement requirements of mm-Wave frequencies. In addition, we design a completely softwarized algorithm, called M-WAVE, in order to measure the mm-Wave exposure with a programmable spectrum analyzer. Results, obtained from a commercial 5G scenario, reveal that the exposure from the mm-Wave BS is directly proportional to the amount of traffic injected on the wireless link. However, the electric field is always lower than 0.08 V/m, while the downlink traffic is even larger than 800 Mbps