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Possible molecular and cellular mechanisms at the basis of atmospheric electromagnetic field bioeffects

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Cifra, Michal | Apollonio, Francesca | Liberti, Micaela | Garcia-Sanchez, Tomas | Mir, Lluis, M.

Edité par CCSD ; Springer Verlag -

International audience. Mechanisms of how electromagnetic (EM) field acts on biological systems are governed by thesame physics regardless of the origin of the EM field (technological, atmospheric, ...), given thatEM parameters are the same. We draw from a large body of literature of bioeffects of a man-madeelectromagnetic field and in this paper, we perform a focused review on selected possiblemechanisms of how atmospheric electromagnetic phenomena can act at the molecular and cellularlevel. We first briefly review the range of frequencies and field strengths for both electric andmagnetic fields in the atmosphere. Then we focus on a concise description of the currentknowledge on weak electric and magnetic field bioeffects with possible molecular mechanisms atthe basis of possible EM field bioeffects combined to modeling strategies to estimate reliableoutcomes and speculate about the biological effects linked to lightning or pyroelectricity. Indeed,we bring pyroelectricity as a natural source of voltage gradients previously unexplored. While verydifferent from lightning, it can result in similar bioeffects based on similar mechanisms, which canlead to close speculations on the importance of these atmospheric electric fields in the evolution.

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