Chen Guangdi, Lu Deqiang, Chiang Huai, Leszczynski Dariusz, Xu Zhengping
Bioelectromagnetics Laboratory, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, China.
Bioelectromagnetics. 2012 Oct;33(7):550-60. doi: 10.1002/bem.21724. Epub 2012 Apr 9.
The potential health hazard of exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMF) continues to cause public concern. However, the possibility of biological and health effects of exposure to EMF remains controversial and their biophysical mechanisms are unknown. In the present study, we used Saccharomyces cerevisiae to identify genes responding to extremely low frequency magnetic fields (ELF-MF) and to radiofrequency EMF (RF-EMF) exposures. The yeast cells were exposed for 6 h to either 0.4 mT 50 Hz ELF-MF or 1800 MHz RF-EMF at a specific absorption rate of 4.7 W/kg. Gene expression was analyzed by microarray screening and confirmed using real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). We were unable to confirm microarray-detected changes in three of the ELF-MF responsive candidate genes using RT-PCR (P > 0.05). On the other hand, out of the 40 potential RF-EMF responsive genes, only the expressions of structural maintenance of chromosomes 3 (SMC3) and aquaporin 2 (AQY2 (m)) were confirmed, while three other genes, that is, halotolerance protein 9 (HAL9), yet another kinase 1 (YAK1) and one function-unknown gene (open reading frame: YJL171C), showed opposite changes in expression compared to the microarray data (P < 0.05). In conclusion, the results of this study suggest that the yeast cells did not alter gene expression in response to 50 Hz ELF-MF and that the response to RF-EMF is limited to only a very small number of genes. The possible biological consequences of the gene expression changes induced by RF-EMF await further investigation.
暴露于电磁场（EMF）对健康的潜在危害持续引发公众关注。然而，暴露于EMF产生生物和健康影响的可能性仍存在争议，其生物物理机制也尚不明确。在本研究中，我们使用酿酒酵母来鉴定对极低频磁场（ELF-MF）和射频电磁场（RF-EMF）暴露产生响应的基因。将酵母细胞暴露于0.4 mT 50 Hz的ELF-MF或1800 MHz的RF-EMF 6小时，比吸收率为4.7 W/kg。通过微阵列筛选分析基因表达，并使用实时逆转录-聚合酶链反应（RT-PCR）进行确认。我们无法通过RT-PCR证实微阵列检测到的ELF-MF响应候选基因中的三个基因发生了变化（P>0.05）。另一方面，在40个潜在的RF-EMF响应基因中，仅证实了染色体结构维持蛋白3（SMC3）和水通道蛋白2（AQY2（m））的表达，而另外三个基因，即耐盐蛋白9（HAL9）、另一种激酶1（YAK1）和一个功能未知基因（开放阅读框：YJL171C），与微阵列数据相比，表达出现了相反的变化（P<0.05）。总之，本研究结果表明，酵母细胞对50 Hz的ELF-MF未发生基因表达改变，且对RF-EMF的响应仅限于极少数基因。RF-EMF诱导的基因表达变化可能产生的生物学后果有待进一步研究。
