Measuring EM Waves for Home/Office Safety?

Q-Neb writes "I'm beginning to get freaked out by the degree of electromagnetic waves I know are floating through me at all times. I work in the computing hub of a small college, surrounded by wires, a wireless AirConnect LAN, and about 500 students constantly gabbing on their cell-phones. As of this weekend, our office has become overrun by ants, apparently attracted by the high microwave presence (and leftover Coke)... How can I measure the amount of airborne communication passing through my workplace or my home? (Am I just paranoid, or is 3Com really out to get me?)"

Comments

Re:I already covered this the other day...

[lizrd]

Thank you for posting this. I'm glad that there are a few other Physics people around here. I find people who know what they're talking about to be so much more interesting than the conspiracy theorists and sham science pushers that seem to predominate this forum.

Here's the simple truth. EM waves with a wavelength longer than UV light (this includes everything we call light, IR or radio waves) won't cause cancer. They don't have enough energy to break DNA and therefore can't cause the mutations that lead to cancer. The only effect that these longer waves can have to to produce some heating.

To give you an idea, of how minimal the exposure from devices like cell phones is keep in mind that most of these devices radiate RF power at 1 Watt or less into the open air (unless you put the antenna in your mouth at least 1/2 of the energy radiates away from your head). This contrasts with a microwave oven which produces 700-1000W of RF power and furthermore, has reflective sides to keep the waves in the oven until they are absorbed by the food. What this means is that it would be very difficult to heat something like your head with a mobile phone or wireless LAN. Your head is pretty similar to a plate with 3 dozen scrambled eggs on it. Think about how long it would take to warm said plate of eggs in a microwave oven. I'm betting somewhere in the neighborhood of a minute. Now imagine that the microwave is less than 1/2000th as strong and you've installed a liquid cooling system in the plate of eggs. I hope that I don't need to say any more.
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