- Headaches, nausea, dizziness, short-term memory problems,
fatigue, and other complaints resulting from cellular phone use are not
due to low-level heating of the brain; instead, they're apparently caused
by the head serving as an "antenna" and brain tissue as a radio
receiver, according to two Jerusalem researchers.
- Zvi Weinberger, a physicist who heads the applied physics
department at the Jerusalem College of Technology, and Dr. Elihu Richter,
head of the occupational medicine unit at the Hebrew University-Hadassah
Braun School of Public Health, suggested this in the latest issue of the
journal Medical Hypotheses.
- Mobile phones, they explained, "broadcast specifically
at frequencies at which the head serves as an antenna and brain tissue
serves as a demodulating radio receiver." Thus, precaution must be
taken in the use of cellphones, they wrote.
- They called for a "reexamination of the assumptions"
underlying the US Federal Communications Commission statement that the
typical radio frequency exposures to cellphones are safe. Instead, the
researchers suggested that past studies on which the FCC based its statement
"are not applicable" to the cellphone frequencies for which the
head acts as a resonator.
- Weinberger suggested that using a stethoscope-like extension
device that transmits sound from the cellphone by air to the ear attached
to the phone would be safer, as this device does not transmit electromagnetic
radiation.
- The researchers said the oval-shaped head has a short
axis of 16 to 17 centimeters long. This dimension is equal to a half wavelength
for frequencies in the 900 megahertz range. It is equal to a complete wavelength
at 1800 Mhz. This shape is perfect for making the head serve as a resonator
for electromagnetic radiation emitted by the cellphone, which causes it
to absorb much of the energy specifically from these wavelengths.
- Numerical analysis shows that at 900 Mhz, the adult-sized
head absorbs 80 percent of the radiation emitted by a cellular phone, while
the head of a seven-year-old child absorbs only 69% of the radiation due
to its smaller size, Weinberger told The Jerusalem Post. But because children's
heads are growing, this lower amount of radiation absorption is much more
dangerous, he said.
- Therefore, the British scientific recommendation that
children use cellphones as infrequently as possible should be followed,
Weinberger added.
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- http://www.jpost.com
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