Early‐Life Exposure to Pulsed LTE Radiofrequency Fields Causes Persistent Changes in Activity and Behavior in C57BL/6 J Mice

Abstract

Despite much research, gaps remain in knowledge about the potential health effects of exposure to radiofrequency (RF) fields. This study investigated the effects of early‐life exposure to pulsed long term evolution (LTE) 1,846 MHz downlink signals on innate mouse behavior. Animals were exposed for 30 min/day, 5 days/week at a whole‐body average specific energy absorption rate (SAR) of 0.5 or 1 W/kg from late pregnancy (gestation day 13.5) to weaning (postnatal day 21). A behavioral tracking system measured locomotor, drinking, and feeding behavior in the home cage from 12 to 28 weeks of age. The exposure caused significant effects on both appetitive behaviors and activity of offspring that depended on the SAR. Compared with sham‐exposed controls, exposure at 0.5 W/kg significantly decreased drinking frequency (P ≤ 0.000) and significantly decreased distance moved (P ≤ 0.001). In contrast, exposure at 1 W/kg significantly increased drinking frequency (P ≤ 0.001) and significantly increased moving duration (P ≤ 0.005). In the absence of other plausible explanations, it is concluded that repeated exposure to low‐level RF fields in early life may have a persistent and long‐term effect on adult behavior. Bioelectromagnetics. 2019;40:498–511. © 2019 The Authors. Bioelectromagnetics Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

The effect of exposure to radiofrequency LTE signal and coexposure to mitomycin‐C in Chinese hamster lung fibroblast V79 cells

“…Most of them report on the effects on brain function in both rat models (Ozdemir et al, 2021; Souffi et al, 2022) and human subjects (Lv et al, 2014; Vecsei et al, 2018; Wei et al, 2019; Yang et al, 2017, 2021). Alterations on behavior (Broom et al, 2019), fertility (Hasan et al, 2021; Oh et al, 2018; Yu et al, 2020), and hematological parameters (Hasan et al, 2021) have also been reported in mice models.…”

Exposure to 1800 MHz LTE electromagnetic fields under proinflammatory conditions decreases the response strength and increases the acoustic threshold of auditory cortical neurons

“…So far, animal studies have been seldom used to determine how exposure to LTE signals could affect brain functions. It was recently reported that whole body exposures of developing mice from late embryonic stages to weaning (30 min/day, 5 days/week, whole body average SAR of 0.5 or 1 W/kg) can cause altered locomotion and appetitive behaviors in adult life 14 . Repeated whole body exposures of adult rats (2 h a day for 6 weeks) were found to trigger oxidative stress and reduced the amplitude visual evoked potential obtained from the optic nerve, while the maximum SAR was estimated to be as low as 10 mW/kg 15 .…”

Exposure to 1800 MHz LTE electromagnetic fields under proinflammatory conditions decreases the response strength and increases the acoustic threshold of auditory cortical neurons

“…So far, animal studies have been seldom used to determine how exposure to LTE signals could affect brain functions. It was recently reported that whole body exposures of developing mice from late embryonic stages to weaning can cause altered locomotion and appetitive behaviors in adult life (Broom et al 2019). Repeated exposures of adult rats were found to trigger oxidative stress and reduced the amplitude visual evoked potential obtained from the optic nerve (Ozdemir et al 2021).…”