Sudden death in epileptic rats exposed to nocturnal magnetic fields that simulate the shape and the intensity of sudden changes in geomagnetic activity: an experiment in response to Schnabel, Beblo and May

Abstract

To test the hypothesis that sudden unexplained death (SUD) in some epileptic patients is related to geomagnetic activity we exposed rats in which limbic epilepsy had been induced to experimentally produced magnetic fields designed to simulate sudden storm commencements (SSCs). Prior studies with rats had shown that sudden death in groups of rats in which epilepsy had been induced months earlier was associated with the occurrence of SSCs and increased geomagnetic activity during the previous night. Schnabel et al. [(2000) Neurology 54:903-908] found no relationship between SUD in human patients and geomagnetic activity. A total of 96 rats were exposed to either 500, 50, 10-40 nT or sham (less than 10 nT) magnetic fields for 6 min every hour between midnight and 0800 hours (local time) for three successive nights. The shape of the complex, amplitude-modulated magnetic fields simulated the shape and structure of an average SSC. The rats were then seized with lithium and pilocarpine and the mortality was monitored. Whereas 10% of the rats that had been exposed to the sham field died within 24 h, 60% of the rats that had been exposed to the experimental magnetic fields simulating natural geomagnetic activity died (P<.001) during this period. These results suggest that correlational analyses between SUD in epileptic patients and increased geomagnetic activity can be simulated experimentally in epileptic rats and that potential mechanisms might be testable directly.

Leaps in cardiovascular diseases after a decrease of hard cosmic ray flux and atmospheric pressure in Vilnius city in 2004–2007

“…Hence, HCRF variations indirectly reflect the variations of the geomagnetic field, which influences the human body. In the present study, the effect refers to CVD leaps which can change the rhythm of bodily activity and lead to fatal cases (Stoupel et al 2000(Stoupel et al , 2002Persinger et al 2005).…”

“…Near the ground, variations of the geomagnetic field are insignificant (some tens of nT) (Persinger et al 2005), and their registration is rather inaccurate because of a series of various hindrances, both natural and artificial. Therefore, for a continuous registration of geomagnetic field variations, its indirect indicator-hard cosmic ray flux (HCRF)-has been chosen.…”

Temporally-Patterned Magnetic Fields Induce Complete Fragmentation in Planaria

“…The FM pattern (Thomas.dac) was composed of 849 values (each between 0 and 256). It is known for its capacity to induce analgesia in several vertebrate and invertebrate species [19]–[22]. The duration each point was activated, the point duration, was 3 ms.…”

Developmental effects of perinatal exposure to extremely weak 7 Hz magnetic fields and nitric oxide modulation in the Wistar albino rat

“…The current study examines the interaction between exposure of dams to a 7 Hz, square‐wave EMF and NO modulation with NO inhibitor NMA (0.5 g/L) or NO precursor LA (1.0 g/L) from 2 days before to 14 days after birth. The 7 Hz frequency within a narrow intensity band around 50 nT has previously been shown to be therapeutic in models of multiple sclerosis (Cook and Persinger, 2000; Kinoshameg and Persinger, 2004), may be linked to seizure activity and sudden infant death (Persinger et al, 2005) and acts as a zeitgeber for many biologically important functions (Cherry, 2002). Field intensities of 5, 50 and 500 nT were used in order to address the possibility of intensity windowing (Blackman, 2006).…”