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Electric Shavers Rot Your Brain
Damek writes "According to UW researchers, prolonged exposure to low-level magnetic fields, similar to those emitted by such common household devices as blow dryers, electric blankets and razors, can damage brain cell DNA. The damage appears to be cumulative, so you'd best get rid of your electric razors & blankets ASAP! The full study is available online now. No word yet for Cell Phone users' brains..."
Wouldn't this only be a problem if you use these devices every day directly in contact with your skull? I mean, is the range really that far reaching? If the range really is that far reaching, what about power tools and such? Of course, I can think of a few people [McBride] I'd like to have power tools come in direct contact with their skull, but that's beside the point.
A programmer is a machine for converting coffee into code.
I'd say that apoptosis is better characterized as "natural cell death". It's a natural and essential part of the cell's life cycle, and certainly isn't as alarming as the article's tone suggests.
In fact, we have a word for cells that don't undergo apoptosis: Cancer.
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
How does staring at a monitor for 10-14 hours a day affect your brain? Not good is my guess.
What about headphones? If something powered only by a couple of AA batteries causes damage, how about my headphones with two silver dollar sized speakers in them?
uggg...
What about living directly under a ~40kV power line?
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
Well, looks like you've been using electric razors & electric blankets far too long :)
Free XBox, PS2
They're low-level magnetic fields. Headphones, speakers, etc etc.
Also, let us note that when the article discusses 'apoptosis' (which, indeed, may be called natural cell death - where a cell simply stops living and breaks down its DNA in response to some trigger), it points out that the incidence of apoptosis and necrosis were increased by a statistically significant amount by the presence of magnetic fields.
All in all, kiddies, take yer vitamin E and melatonin regularly if you use a cell phone or blow drier. You should be all right then.. :)
Thinking outside my Head
mobile phones operate at frequencies many millions of times higher than the fields used in this study. cellular damage from exposure to low-frequency fields (if real) would surely be mediated by a different effect than cellular damage from exposure to high-frequency fields (if real).
i am skeptical of this study because a friend of mine who works in biomagnetics assures me that the effects of high B-fields on human tissue were carefully invesigated prior to the approval of MRI macines for use in biomedical imaging. any ill effects due to low-frequency or DC fields would have been found at that time. of course this is just hearsay and i am not qualified (or inclined) to assess this particular study on it's scientific merit! : )
And what qualifies as prolonged? Are some people so shaggy that they are using electric razors for hours on end? and not only that, but the only thing in an electric razor is a recharchable battery, maybe some electronics for charging said battery, and a motor and wires and switch. Millions of devices have these things in them, and humanity as a whole isn't getting stupider by the second (although sometimes it does seem that way). Scientists who make brilliant discoveries (and geeks in general) tend to have more of these devices, and these people represent the smartest people that humanity has to offer.
I think this may be a case of a study finding some correlation where there really shouldn't be any, or just bad methods overall. I'm currently taking part in a medical study, and if nothing else i've learned that there a ton of ways for the participants and doctors to skew the results. Designing a good study is essential, but actually carrying it out properly is the tough part.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
Ever see that experiment where they stand a plate of solid aluminium on its edge in the center of an MRI scanner? Whe they let go, It falls down really slowly due to magnetic flux. (antiflux? its been a while since my last physics class :) )
That is not the same as 'starting to move on its own', granted. But magnetic fields do have an influence on non magnetic metals....
The Bigger The Headache The Bigger the Pill
You shave for maybe 5 minutes very second day, or perhaps even less often. With prsonal music you have speakers next to, or even inside, your ears for hours on end.
People sleep all night, often every night, with electric blankets warming their bodies, and if it's cold they tuck their heads under the covers too. I'd think that'd be an even greater risk than the headphones.
The free radicals do the damage, so just consume foods with antioxidants and everything will be fine.
Crisis averted.
Because more damage was done in 48 hours than in 24, so it is cumulative in the rats tested. They speculated that this maybe the case in other organisms because the kind of damage done is double stranded DNA breaks that are harder to repair than single stranded nicks. They cited other research which suggests the mechanism for repairing this damage is to remove the damaged cell which is replaced by cell division. This is great, except for the fact that neurons don't replicate in this fashion so it could lead to the accumulation defects. Maybe the effect is small, maybe it varies highly with some individuals being more susceptible, or maybe neurons have alternative repair mechanism, but I think it is worth more research.
I'm not moving to a log cabin with no electricity anytime soon, but I'd like this research followed up with more experiments.
Isn't a rat's skull much thinner than a human's? Wouldn't a thicker skull protect your brain better than a thinner one? If they really wanted to compare the effects on humans, they should have put helmets on the rats.
ayottesoftware.com
"Exposure to a 60-Hz magnetic field at 0.01 mT for 24 hrs caused a significant increase in DNA single and double strand breaks."
If this is true, just imagine what the 4T used by the MRI scanner at your local hospital will do to you.
Most people get the majory of their EMF exposure from their alarm clocks. While it's not quite as strong as a hair dryer or electric shaver, you're exposed to it for about 8 hours every day instead of 5 minutes.
Hell, pretty much anything becomes paramagnetic if you have strong enough fields. Some things have stronger diamagnetic properties than others though.
Aluminum is actually fairly paramagnetic, if I recall.
Back in 1997 a group even levitated a frog in a 16 Tesla field. How fun is that?
A preposition is a terrible thing to end a sentence with.
MRI tends to operate in the area of 1T, which is 2000 - 10000 times stronger than the fields used in this study.
There have been a number of studies in the past that have tried to link exposure to magnetic fields to cancer (particularly leukemia in children who live near high voltage power lines). It has generally been scoffed at, as the energies involved are not enough to break chemical bonds. However, by involving iron and free radicals, the energies involved can have an impact on reactivity.
Makes me wonder, given I did my Ph.D. dissertation in a lab that studied free radicals, using machines that generated fields of 0.3T (note, not mT) for hours at a time...
If you can't beat them, embrace and extend them.
No I'm not kidding.
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There used to be shavers that relied on the user using a squeezing action to pump a ratchet gear which kept an internal flywheel working.
They were manufactured by "Viceroy". I was given a broken one to play with when I was a kid. I was fascinated by it.
http://www.fixyourshaver.com/images/Viceroy_193
http://bakelite_world_2001.tripod.com/itsbake
Is there as causal link between women using vibrators and medical problems?
Anyway, before items such as those we may have seen on television appeared e.g. as found here: http://www.toysforusonline.com/productlstR.cfm?ca
there were clockwork alternatives, as theis article explains, (diagram half way down page):
http://www.libidomag.com/nakedbrunch/main
My hyperlinks aren't worth the paper they're printed on.
I wonder what the magetic fields from my '04 Prius' electric motor is doing? Also, has anyone else noticed their cassette tapes have a 2 week half life?
Maybe I should just disconnect myself from the so called grid, move out into the country and orienteer in the dark for entertainment. All I'll need is matches and a compass ... (?) .... AAAAIIIRRRGGH !!!
My God, I'm doomed....
Dean G.
The effect noted in the article is hypothesized to be caused by a Fenton reaction. This is the reaction of iron with other materials to form radicals. In this case it would be to form oxidizing radicals, such as hyperoxide species. These cause oxidative stress and damage if they're too concentrated. This was discussed in a recent /. article on high EM fields (http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/ 09/1223246&tid=). Their hypothesis comes from the fact that they used oxidizer scrubbers, like vitamin E, to prevent the effect. Oxidative stress is blamed for causing Parkinson's and other apoptosis based disorders, arthritis and non-viral immunosuppression (chronic fatigue/immune deficiency syndrome).
As I said then, we're sadly ignorant about the effects of water in its various conditions and products due to external forces, on our systems. We're starting to find out a lot of answers, good and bad, are focused on water. In this respect, this article makes perfect sense.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
OK.. I'm looking at this... and I REALLY don't know very much about cell biology, but I have to ask.. they seem to be really, really worried about DNA being damaged by this. Except as far as I am aware, brain cells never reproduce or divide. Is this correct, and if so, why would I worry about the DNA being damaged if Mitosis is never going to happen? Unless, like, you're shaving the head of a two week old baby or something.
The implication I guess is that cell breakdown and death occurs more quickly, but aren't you constantly losing brain cells at a breakneck pace anyway?
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
I'd say that apoptosis is better characterized as "natural cell death". It's a natural and essential part of the cell's life cycle, and certainly isn't as alarming as the article's tone suggests.
Yes and no. There are certainly cells that naturally undergo apoptosis (a.k.a. programmed cell death) in their life cycles. If not for apoptosis, we'd all have webbed fingers. But apoptosis also seems to function as an "emergency self destruct" circumstance in which something has gone catastrophically wrong with a cell. And just as in the movies, it's likely that occasionally something manages to push that big red button by mistake...
My electric shaver has a Nicad battery that is charged by AC power, but the motor itself runs off of power from the DC battery. I'm not an EE major, but isn't having a DC current next to your head a lot different than having a 60 hz AC current running next to your head?
:-)
I'm just curious, because I just bought a nice electric shaver and I'd like to keep using it. I never use my shaver while it's plugged into the wall. I only plug it in about once a week to recharge it.
There is an increasing number of western medical doctors that are starting to believe that having electric fields near your body aren't health for you. One of my favorite doctors, Dr. Weil, who has a great website, by the way, recommends that you should get rid of the clock radio by your nightstand as well as any electric blankets in your house. It has also been proven that women who spend 8 hours a day in front of a CRT monitor during pregnancy have a higher rate of birth defects. Exposure to electromagnetic fields can't be that good for you, so I try to stay away from them...
Of course, I'm typing this from my Powerbook sitting on my lap while I sit on the couch, with the AC adapter plugged in and charging away... Maybe I shouldn't try to have kids for the next little while...
"When the president does it, that means it's not illegal." - Richard M. Nixon
Aren't most electric razors these days battery powered? Mine is. So, I'm not using that 60Hz AC wall power.
But, I assume the electric motor emits an electric field. I wonder how that compares to the field in their study.
When I was in Radio Shack a few months ago, I saw a sign posted that looked somewhat like this:
WARNING
Certain components sold
in this store, such as portable
CD players, contain lead, which can cause
cancer. You should wash your hands thorougly after
touching these materials.
Of course, it was a lot more formal than that (I don't exactly possess a degree in Lawyer Talk), but that was basically the gist of it.
Now, it's kind of hard to take an article like this seriously when stuff like this is being posted. How much risk, exactly, is there in getting lead poisoning from a portable CD player?
Defenestrate Windows...
Draping your welding cable over your shoulder and behind your back so that it passes near your wallet while welding will eventually ruin your credit cards too.
Why throw it over your shoulder like a continental soldier? It's easier to weld a clean bead and less tiring when you're not holding up 5 feet of #2 AWG cable with the stinger.
If the only tool you have is a hammer, you'd better start looking for a carpentry job.
Yeah... welcome to the club. Ahh the powers of an NMR magnet - erased my credit cards on my last day of work before going on vacation. Found myself in italy the next day with a fried card. Yay.
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