Spending the night next to a router – Results from the first human experimental study investigating the impact of Wi-Fi exposure on sleep

Danker‐Hopfe, Heidi; Bueno-Lopez, Ana; Dorn, Hans; Schmid, Gernot; Hirtl, Rene; Eggert, Torsten

doi:10.1016/j.ijheh.2020.113550

Cited by 11 publications

(11 citation statements)

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“…The same applies to the study by Danker‐Hopfe et al. (2020), which examined the impact of Wi‐Fi exposure on a large number of objective sleep parameters in addition to some subjective sleep variables. This previous study, however, considered sleep data from all 34 recruited participants and disregarded deliberately some of the sleep‐specific variables that are thought to be associated with memory consolidation processes.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

“…The impact of Wi‐Fi exposure on sleep is reported in Danker‐Hopfe et al. (2020) based on the recruited sample of 34 participants. The present analysis focuses on possible Wi‐Fi exposure effects on memory consolidation and associated sleep parameters.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…An increase of the number of participants to 34 as realized in Danker‐Hopfe et al. (2020) allowed therefore for the detection of even smaller effects by using the same input parameters for statistical power and significance level.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For these analyses, electrode locations were topographically grouped into six brain regions: frontopolar (Fp1, Fp2), frontal (F7, F3, Fz, F4, F8), central (C3, Cz, C4), temporal (T3, T4, T5, T6), parietal (P3, Pz, P4) and occipital (O1, O2). Artifacts were excluded from the final analysis (for a description of the artifact exclusion process, see Appendix Artifact exclusion and Danker‐Hopfe et al., 2020). Additionally, a MATLAB‐based (MathWorks Inc.) automatic spindle detection algorithm (Lacourse et al., 2019) that emulates human scoring was used in order to analyse sleep spindle density.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Based on these findings, the question arose whether a Wi‐Fi exposure, which can be the most prominent RF‐EMF source in a home setting during the night (Roser et al., 2017; Tomitsch et al., 2010), may also interact with endogenous brain activity and affect sleep‐dependent memory consolidation processes. In a recent project, the impact of a whole‐night Wi‐Fi exposure on sleep was investigated in a sample of 34 young healthy male volunteers (Danker‐Hopfe et al., 2020). For a subsample of 30 subjects, data on sleep‐dependent memory consolidation were also available, which will be considered in the present paper.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effects of 2.45 GHz Wi‐Fi exposure on sleep‐dependent memory consolidation

Bueno-Lopez

Eggert

Dorn

et al. 2020

Journal of Sleep Research

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Studies have reported that exposure to radiofrequency electromagnetic fields (RF‐EMF) emitted by mobile telephony might affect specific sleep features. Possible effects of RF‐EMF emitted by Wi‐Fi networks on sleep‐dependent memory consolidation processes have not been investigated so far. The present study explored the impact of an all‐night Wi‐Fi (2.45 GHz) exposure on sleep‐dependent memory consolidation and its associated physiological correlates. Thirty young males (mean ± standard deviation [SD]: 24.1 ± 2.9 years) participated in this double‐blind, randomized, sham‐controlled crossover study. Participants spent five nights in the laboratory. The first night was an adaptation/screening night. The second and fourth nights were baseline nights, each followed consecutively by an experimental night with either Wi‐Fi (maximum: psSAR10g = <25 mW/kg; 6 min average: <6.4 mW/kg) or sham exposure. Declarative, emotional and procedural memory performances were measured using a word pair, a sequential finger tapping and a face recognition task, respectively. Furthermore, learning‐associated brain activity parameters (power spectra for slow oscillations and in the spindle frequency range) were analysed. Although emotional and procedural memory were not affected by RF‐EMF exposure, overnight improvement in the declarative task was significantly better in the Wi‐Fi condition. However, none of the post‐learning sleep‐specific parameters was affected by exposure. Thus, the significant effect of Wi‐Fi exposure on declarative memory observed at the behavioural level was not supported by results at the physiological level. Due to these inconsistencies, this result could also be a random finding.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 89%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%