Microwaves emitted by cellular telephones affect human slow brain potentials.

Freude G, Ullsperger P, Eggert S, Ruppe I,

Eur J Appl Physiol 81(1-2):18-27, 2000

The influence of electromagnetic fields (EMF) emitted by cellular telephones on preparatory slow brain potentials (SP) was studied in two experiments, about 6 months apart. In the first experiment, a significant decrease of SP was found during exposure to EMF in a complex visual monitoring task (VMT). This effect was replicated in the second experiment.

In addition to the VMT, EMF effects on SP were analysed in two further, less demanding tasks: in a simple finger movement task to elicit a Bereitschaftspotential (BP) and in a two-stimulus task to elicit a contingent negative variation (CNV). In comparison to the VMT, no significant main EMF effects were found in BP and CNV tasks.

The results accounted for a selective EMF effect on particular aspects of human information processing, but did not indicate any influence on human performance, well-being and health.