Pulsed High-Peak Power Microwaves at 9.4 GHz Do Not Affect Basic Endpoints in Caenorhabditis elegans

A review of effects of electromagnetic fields on ageing and ageing dependent bioeffects of electromagnetic fields

Thanks to the progress of science and technology, human life expectancy has dramatically increased in the past few decades, but accompanied by rapid ageing of population, resulting in increased burden on society. At the same time, the living environment, especially the electromagnetic environment, has also greatly changed due to science and technology advances. The effect of artificial electromagnetic fields (EMFs) emitted from power lines, mobile phones, wireless equipment, and other devices on ageing and ageing-related diseases are receiving increasing attention. However, the information on the relationship between EMFs and ageing and ageing related susceptibility to EMFs is fragmentary, a review is needed. Only few studies directly investigate the effect of EMFs on ageing, and we reviewed the impact of EMFs on lifespan and cellular senescence to pry whether EMFs have an effect on ageing, and reviewed the age-dependent bioeffects and health impacts of EMFs to see whether ageing would affect biological susceptibility to EMFs. The results indicated that EMFs may have an effect on longevity and cellular senescence, but the results were inconsistent which may depend on EMF types (frequency, intensity, wave shape, etc.), species, and cell lines. Ageing has an impact on the biological or health effects of EMFs; however, the results differ depending on the EMF type and the endpoint or health outcome. Age-dependent changes in free radical metabolism, ion homeostasis, gene expression, enzyme activity, and tissue biophysical properties may be the reason; however, the underlying mechanisms are not fully elucidated.

A reliable and quick method for screening alternative splicing variants for low-abundance genes

Alternative splicing (AS) is a universal phenomenon in eukaryotes, and it is still challenging to identify AS events. Several methods have been developed to identify AS events, such as expressed sequence tags (EST), microarrays and RNA-seq. However, EST has limitations in identifying low-abundance genes, while microarray and RNA-seq are high-throughput technologies, and PCR-based technology is needed for validation. To overcome the limitations of EST and shortcomings of high-throughput technologies, we established a method to identify AS events, especially for low-abundance genes, by reverse transcription (RT) PCR with gene-specific primers (GSPs) followed by nested PCR. This process includes two major steps: 1) the use of GSPs to amplify as long as the specific gene segment and 2) multiple rounds of nested PCR to screen the AS and confirm the unknown splicing variants. With this method, we successfully identified three new splicing variants, namely, GenBank Accession No. HM623886 for the bdnf gene (GenBank GeneID: 12064), GenBank Accession No. JF417977 for the trkc gene (GenBank GeneID: 18213) and GenBank Accession No. HM623888 for the glb-18 gene (GenBank GeneID: 172485). In addition to its reliability and simplicity, the method is also cost-effective and labor-intensive. In conclusion, we developed an RT-nested PCR method using gene-specific primers to efficiently identify known and novel AS variants. This approach overcomes the limitations of existing methods for detecting rare transcripts. By enabling the discovery of new isoforms, especially for low-abundance genes, this technique can aid research into aberrant splicing in disease. Future studies can apply this method to uncover AS variants involved in cancer, neurodegeneration, and other splicing-related disorders.

A broadband multi-frequency microwave combined biological exposure setup

With the rapid popularization of wireless electronic devices, there has been an increasing concern about the impacts of the electromagnetic environment on health. However, most research reports on the biological effects of microwaves have focused on a single frequency point. In reality, people are exposed to complex electromagnetic environments that consist of multiple frequency microwave signals in their daily lives. It is important to investigate whether multi-frequency combined microwave energies have different biological effects compared with single frequency microwave energy. Unfortunately, there are limited reports on this topic due to the lack of suitable platforms for research on multi-frequency microwave energy combined with biological exposure. To address this issue, this study presents a setup that has a very wide working frequency bandwidth and can be compatible with single frequency and multi-frequency microwave combined exposure. Moreover, it can achieve relatively equal exposure to multiple biological samples at any frequency point in the working frequency range, which is crucial for electromagnetic biology research. The experimental results are in good agreement with the simulation results, confirming its capability to facilitate the study of complex electromagnetic environment effects on organisms.