Cell Damage Links
June 24,
2002 10:54 GMT
Marc van Impe /
Newscasters
According a Finnish study mobile
phone radiation can cause changes in human cells that might affect the brain,
Darius Leszczynski, the leader of the research team said on Wednesday.
Leszczynski, who headed the two-year study and will present findings this week
at a conference in Quebec, said more research was needed to determine the
seriousness of the changes and their impact on the brain or the body.
The study at Finland's Radiation and Nuclear Safety
Authority (STUK) found that exposure to radiation from mobile phones can cause
increased activity in hundreds of proteins in human cells grown in a laboratory,
he said.
"We know that there is some biological response.
We can detect it with our very sensitive approaches, but we do not know whether
it can have any physiological effects on the human brain or human body,"
Leszczynski said.
The study focused on changes in cells that line blood
vessels and on whether such changes could weaken the functioning of the
blood-brain barrier which prevents potentially harmful substances from entering
the brain from the blood stream, Leszczynski said. "The study found that a
protein linked to the functioning of the blood-brain barrier showed increased
activity due to irradiation and pointed to a possibility that such activity
could make the shield more permeable, he said. This increased protein activity
might cause cells to shrinkwhich would open tiny gaps ar between those cells
through which some molecules could pass," he said.
Leszczynski declined to speculate on what kind of
health risks that could pose, but said a French study indicated that headache,
fatigue and sleep disorders could result.
Finnish
study says cells react to mobile phone radiation
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