The most serious biological effect of non-ionising radiation is its ability to disrupt cell membranes. This has been known since the work of Suzanne Bawin and her co-workers in 1975 (Ann NY Acad Sci Vol 247, pp 74-81). They discovered that amplitude-modulated radio-waves, where the signal strength rises and falls (as it does with digital broadcasts such as mobile phones), can remove structurally important calcium ions from cell membranes. This happens at non-thermal broadcast levels. Loss of these Calcium ions makes the cell membranes leak, which can give a whole range of biological effects that are similar to those of ionising radiation, which also makes cell membranes leak. The mechanism is different. Ionising radiation generates highly reactive free radicals, which destroy the fatty components of cell membranes to make permanent holes, whereas non-ionising radiation makes temporary holes as the components of the weakened membrane pull apart from time to time. Nevertheless, the effect is the same; the membranes leak.
In either case, the most significant effect is on the membranes of the lysosomes. These are structures in living cells that contain digestive enzymes and are normally used to digest waste for recycling during the normal cellular turnover process. When these leak, they release their enzymes and seriously damage to the rest of the cell, including its DNA. Bacteria, which have no lysosomes, are about a thousand times more resistant to radiation than higher organisms and so will persist in situations where humans are immuno-compromised by exposure to EM pollution. The effects of non-ionising radiation are slower than ionising radiation. For example, it takes several hours for exposure to mobile phone radiation to do serious damage to the DNA in living cells but the effects are qualitatively the same. The result is an increased risk for heavy mobile phone users of getting brain and other head cancers in later life. There has also been a mysterious increase in cancers of the thyroid gland (which is in the neck, close to where you hold your mobile phone), and a permanent reduction in thyroid function has been reported in rats exposed for more than three months to power line frequencies. In humans, this would be expected to lead to obesity and other symptoms of hypothyroidism. About one third of the population is currently overweight or clinically obese and although diet is of course important it must be considered that thyoid health might be a factor in more people than is currently recognised.
There is also a reduction in fertility in people using mobile phones for more than about four hours a day as sperm, and possibly also the eggs, are damaged. Another effect of DNA damage is the disruption of cell division in the bone marrow, which affects the production of healthy white blood cells and can lead to a reduced immunity to disease.
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