9th Grade Science Experiment: Garden Cress Won't Germinate Near Routers

New submitter SessionExpired writes "Five 9th graders from Denmark have shown that garden cress won't germinate when placed near a router (Google Translation of Danish original). Article text is in Danish, but the pictures illustrate their results. The exact mechanism is still unknown (Danish original), but experts have shown interest in reproducing the experiment."

Comments

Need a control.

[RightSaidFred99]

They should have used a control, and put cress near a lamp bulb that gives off the same amount of heat.

Simplest explanation is the additional heat which was nearby but not enough to alter room temperature affected them.

Re:Need a control.

[jeffmeden]

They should have used a control, and put cress near a lamp bulb that gives off the same amount of heat.

Simplest explanation is the additional heat which was nearby but not enough to alter room temperature affected them.

Typical routers (i presume they are talking about an 802.11 router here) will emit 150 to 250 mW per radio. Even in a 3 radio version the total power is still less than 1W (depending on how high the bandwidth utilization was), and it's certainly spread beyond just the plate of seeds sitting next to it. That 1W of heat energy would have an amazingly small change in overall temperature on the subject, probably not even enough to measure with conventional instruments.

Re:Need a control.

[Peter H.S.]

They placed the AP's so that the heat they generated wouldn't affect the garden cress. Room temperature was computer monitored and regulated, the humidity was regulated, and they photographed the batches to document that no drying up or rot was present. They mixed the seed batches, randomized the seed selection etc etc.

The experimental setup and their elimination of errors and bias is considered to of very high quality, which is why they won a junior science prize. Their actual result meant nothing in that regard.

The first experiment was with idle AP's only broadcasting ESSID. The second experiment added some Linux laptops that ping-flooded to generate lots of network activity. The second experiment showed a clear increase in plant "damage" /lack of development.

Not controlled for other factors

[vivaoporto]

The experiment was setup to validate a foregone conclusion. The (probable, as I can't read the Danish complete report) untested control factor was the impact the different rooms had in the absence of the routers. Retesting both samples without the presence of the routers could fix this issue.

Anyway, it is good science (it is testable and verifiable) but bad journalism.

Unless it can be reproduced or its mechanism explained, it is nothing but fuel to add to the "communication radiation exposure is bad" hysteria.

Re:No reproduction

[Khyber]

"Or just as likely, they just faked the data. "

As someone that has performed similar radiation experiments as part of my research into zero-light horticulture, faking this is very doubtful, as I've encountered the same issues. Germination rates in the area of our facility with wireless access are roughly half of that on the other side of the shed that is totally free of radiation in that frequency range thanks to the natural faraday cage (the entire structure is grounded, metal walls and supports, etc.) that the facility provides. You can't even use your cell phone two feet inside the door.