Quantitation of chronic microwave radiation effects on muscle cell electrical excitable properties: a temperature dependence analysis of the H-H cable and membrane current parameters of irradiated cells.

Frogs Rana pipiens maintained under constant laboratory environmental conditions were subjected daily to chronic microwave exposure with pulsed microwave (2.88 GHZ) at a power density of 10 mW/cm2, during 0.1 hour, for periods up to 100 days. The whole body Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) was of 1.5 mW/g per 1 mW/cm2. The passive and dynamic electrical parameters of sartorius muscle cells from control and irradiated frogs as a function of temperature in the range from 10 C to 30 C, have been analyzed. This temperature dependence analysis, presented in another work, was planned to be used in this paper for detecting those possible "masked" chronic microwave effects in complex membrane mechanisms highly temperature sensitive, and tightly related to the excitation and propagation of bioelectrical responses. The temperature dependence of the passive (Vr, Gm, Cm, and tau) and the active cell electrical parameters (theta, V*, Vs, VNa, Vn, V+, V-, kr, kNa, kK, tau Na, tau K, -gNa, gNa, gK, INa, and IK) was not altered by chronic microwave exposure. The striking observation reported in another work, about the presence of two groups of cell electrical parameters, characterized by their dependence with temperature, was reproduced on the irradiated muscle cells. Results have indicated that there was not muscle cell cumulative bioeffects resulting from microwave exposure to 10 mW/cm2, over a 0.1 hour period.