Cytome assay in two cell lines exposed to ELF-magnetic fields: An investigation on the relation between exposure to ELF-magnetic fields and an alleged increased risk for Alzheimer's disease.

Cell division disturbances, including trisomy (especially involving chromosomes 17 and 21) and gene amplification are hypothesized as factors that may be responsible for Alzheimer's disease and there are a few data in the literature showing that these alterations might also be induced by exposure to magnetic fields. At the present time we use the cytome assay to see whether ELF-magnetic fields may induce indirect genetic damage as that seen in Alzheimer's patients. Later on further in depth analyses will be performed in which we will, for example focus on trisomy 17 and 21.We here report the results of our preliminary studies with the cytome assay in two different cell lines; human C3A and SH-SY5Y cells. C3A cells are derived from a human liver cancer cell line (HepG2). It is especially used because this cell line still contains the metabolic enzyme systems that allow metabolisation (biotransformation) of chemicals the way this happens in the living organism. SH-SY5Y cells are human neuroblastoma cells. This means that they are more relevant in terms of Alzheimer's disease. Cells were cultivated in the laboratory according to standard methods and exposed to 10, 50 100 and 500 µT ELF-MF's according to different exposure regimes: -Continuous exposure during 48h (after a 24h cultivation time)-24h exposure (after 24h cultivation) followed by a 24h recovery period-Exposure during the last 24h of cell cultivation only.