Cell phone radiations affect flora: Study

Blurb: Reduce seedling length, chlorophyll content

Our Correspondent

Una, November 5

Dr Shikha Chandel, botany scholar from Una district, recently completed a research concluding that cell phone radiations cause adverse effects on plants.

The study was part of her PhD thesis, submitted to the Panjab University. Dr Shikha, a resident of Bilaspur, lives in Una. She said flora played a significant role in sustenance of life on the Earth. She said flora was stationary and not covered, due to which, it was more exposed to radiations emitted from cell phones and their base stations.

Dr Shikha said she had carried out her research on rice and onion crops by subjecting their seedlings to radiations at two frequencies measuring 2,100 MHz and 2,350 MHz, which corresponded to signals emitted from the 3G and 4G cellular technologies, respectively. She said the experiments proved that exposure of radiations for longer duration hampered the growth and development of plants.

The researcher said seedling length and biomass of the irradiated seedlings was reduced in comparison to the non-radiated ones, and the chlorophyll content and photosynthetic efficiency was also adversely affected. She said cells of the exposed plants showed cytotoxic and genotoxic alterations.

The radiations also affected the rate of cell division and induced various chromosomal aberrations, while affecting the dignity of the DNA, said Shikha, adding that the exposure of plants to the electromagnetic field radiations also affected the protein, carbohydrate and oxidative metabolism.

According to Dr Shikha, the papers with regard to her research have been published in various international science journals such as ‘Protoplasma’, ‘Journal of Environmental Health Science and Engineering’ and ‘Journal of Microscopy and Ultrastructure’.