ON NATURE OF EFFICENCY OF THE WEAK LOW FREQUENCY EMF IN BIOLOGICAL SYSTEMS
Aksyonov S. I.
Moscow State University, Bioplogical Faculty, Department of Biophysics, 119899, Vorobjovy Gory, Moscow, Russia
To explain the effects of EMF, researchers usually focus on characteristics
of the membranes, because the voltage drop mainly occurs at the membrane.
It should be noted, however, that the external EMF is negligible with respect
to the permanent voltage existing at the membrane and does not exceed the
noise of the intrinsic voltage. On the other hand, the portion of EMF within
the cell is considerably higher, and the magnetic component of EMF also
induces the electromotive force. Moreover, the weak external field may
cause specific biological effects because of non-stationary phenomena,
mediated by relatively slow movement of ions in the electric field. In
this case, the high conductance of solutions, as compared to the membrane
conductance, seems more important than the extent of the voltage drops,
because even low-intensity field would affect the ionic currents. The effects
of EMF should depend on the distance traveled by ions during the period
of EMF within the inhomogeneous cellular medium and, consequently, should
depend on the amplitude to frequency ratio (low amplitudes correspond to
low frequencies). In the particular case of geomagnetic fluctuations, the
distance traveled by ions during one period is close to the cell dimension.
The periodic action on ions in the heterogeneous environment (the cell)
should result in nonlinear effects accomplished in the thin boundary layer
near the membrane. Under the action of high-intensity EMF, ions would cross
the whole cell distance and reach the membrane; in this case, the nonlinear
effects would be less significant. The effect of EMF would be weakened
and reduced to the effect of the voltage drop across the membrane. The
inhomogeneous distribution of ions produced by the action of EMF would
also affect the nonlinear processes of selective ion exchange across the
membrane, caused by steep transmembrane gradients of K, Na, and Ca. Such
ion exchange would also affect the intracellular pH. This view accounts
for non-monotonous dependencies of biological effects on EMF amplitude,
including a relatively strong effects of weak low-frequency EMF, as well
as effects of geomagnetic fluctuations. Experiments with seeds proved that
the release of esterases is highly sensitive to treatment of seeds with
low-frequency magnetic field. We also revealed the acceleration of pH changes
near the seed embryo after such treatment.