5 Ghz Routers Cause Nausea & Dizziness - To You Too?
The router shown in the figure is Linksys WRT600N Router, that is exactly the one I bought about 4 years ago but currently I operate it at 2.5 Ghz frequency only and I have closed the 5 Ghz band. It is an excellent router no question about it. It was written on the box to keep it 1 meter away from the body. If you are having 5 Ghz band ON for video streaming and even if you are sitting 1 meter away from the device, after 4 hours I think you will feel dizziness and after 8 hours nausea. It happened with me. Never had such feeling before. When I converted 5 Ghz video streaming to wired based, never had such Nausea & Dizziness. 5 Ghz is in microwave range of frequency spectrum.
I have a WRT600N at home which I used for testing. Nice router. I only have one laptop that uses 802.11a so I can't claim much exposure. To the best of my knowledge, I haven't become ill when using it.
That's not going to work because the extra dim LED's are impossible to see unless you shove your face into the front panel.
If I wasted 8 hours in one sitting watching TV, I'm sure I would experience adverse physical effects. Have you considered climbing out of your overstuffed sofa, and getting some casual exercise, such as crushing the beer cans? I solved two problems simultaneously by installing my bicycle on an exercise stand, and pedaling furiously while watching TV. I had some initial problems with hyperventilation, which did cause some dizziness, but that went away as I adapted to the effort. The only change from standard was to place the TV on the floor, where it was easier to see from the bicycle.
There are also physiological causes of nausea and dizziness.
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Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558
On Sun, 23 May 2010 21:24:50 -0700, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
If you stay within the 1 meter range, and assuming the transmitter output several hundred milliwatts, and you do this for extended periods of time, you are probably going to have similiar issues to those people who use cell phones with badly designed antennae. There are known side effects.... but they are down in the statistical noise. Although the power levels are similiar, you don't have your head right up against the antenna as in a cell phone. Given the fairly weak correlation between side effects of cell phones (and they are long term effects), and your much greater distance from the antenna, I'd say your risk is very small. The cell phone issue relates to brain cancer and leukemia for very heavy cell phone users, and for specific (older) models. There are a number of peer reviewed papers on this subject. If you are that certain of the effects, have someone turn the offending unit on or off so that YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT STATE IT IS IN DURING THE TEST. Do a reasonable number of tests (>20) and see if you sense better than 50/50. Your tester should also not know what state the unit is in (double-blind) during your "sensing" period. That requires some form of random on/off switch (10-20 pos rotary sw. with no stops), covering all LEDs, etc. Be aware that the human mind is easily influenced by stimulii that you might think are unrelated to your experiment! For example, if the unit emits the slightest hum, it will probably ruin your experiment, because you would consciously or unconsciously associate it with your symptoms. If you can correlate your experience with the unit being on, then you have something to go on, and it will silence the naysayers. Then it will be an interesting case.
Thank you for changing the subject from wi-fi exposure to cellular exposure.
You might be interested in the following graph of the incidence of new brain and central nervous system cancers in 5 major metro hospitals:
Please note that it's almost constant from 1975 to 2006. During the same time period, use of cell phones increased rather dramatically. The cell phone was invented in 1973, but didn't really "take off" until the early 1990's. If there was a correlation between cell phone use/exposure, it should have shown up as an increase in brain and CNS cancers.
Also see:
which shows the incidence of brain and CNS cancer versus age aggregated from 1992 to 2006. Note that the bulk of the incidence is for age 55 and up. From personal observation, most teenagers have their cell phones glued to their ears. If RF exposure was involved, I would expect a larger incidence among the younger cell phone users.
If you have any information that contradicts any of this, or somehow connects 5.7GHz wi-fi exposure to any of this, I would be interested.
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Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558
You reminded me of a consulting job I had about 15 years ago. A research lab was exposing lab rats to 900MHz RF, and looking for physiological changes, including cancers. They were getting positive results and were preparing to publish. However, the reviewers were worried about how evenly distributed the RF was inside the test box. So, I was dragged in to do the necessary measurements. I shoved a borrowed Narda RF exposure meter into the box, and got nothing. After some tinkering, I determined that the RF connector entering the box was badly assembled and was shorted. There was no RF at all in the box. All the data and positive results were worthless. Needless to say, I was not very popular around the lab after that.
Adding more topic drift, I had a customer that claimed that she could "feel" the radiation coming from her new computah. I did a single blind experiment to see if she could tell if it was turned on and found that she really could. I had no clue, so I walked down the road, injested an ice cream (favorite brain booster), and did some thinking. I used an ultrasonic pipe leak detector to find that the desktop power supply was belching considerable audible ultrasonic noise. I tested every PC power supply I had in stock, found the least disgusting, and replaced her power supply. She claimed she could still "feel" it, but that it was much better. I eventually buried the xformers and inductors in RTV, which solved the noise problem. She was one of the rare adults that did not lose their childhood high frequency hearing.
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Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558
Actually, that has been done. By TNO in the Netherlands. The results have been confirmed by a study in Switserland. In short: Some people are capable of knowing whether a transmitter is on or off.
TNO: Effects of global communication system radio-frequency fields on well being and cognitive functions of human subjects with and without subjective complaints. TNO-report FEL-03-C148, 2003.
Swiss: Regel SJ, Negovetic S, R??sli M, Berdi?as V, Schuderer J, Huss A, Lott U, Kuster N, and Achermann P. 2006. UMTS Base Station-Like Exposure, Well Being and Cognitive Performance Environ Health Perspect: doi:10.1289/ehp.8934. [Online 6 June
The full report is not available for free (few such reports are free). Abstract is free:
Conclusion: Despite very low exposure to HF-EMF, effects on wellbeing and performance cannot be ruled out, as shown by recently obtained experimental results; however, mechanisms of action at these low levels are unknown.
Ummm... that's not exactly definitive. It's more like a solicitation for more research. "Cannot be ruled out" is a phrase often used when "cannot be proven" is more appropriate.
Commentary on the report:
Evidence is emerging that prior beliefs about the risks from modern technology are an important predictor of symptoms from perceived exposures. Thus, by distorting perceptions of risk, disproportionate precaution might paradoxically lead to illness that would not otherwise occur.
In other words, there are some holes in the procedures that need to be fixed before anything conclusive can be claimed. Most such studies are epidemiological meaning that a wide spectrum of environmental, symptomatic, and psychological problems need to be ruled out before the blame can be definitively assigned to RF exposure. As near as I can determine by reading bits and pieces of the original report, the researchers measured the RF intensity (at what frequencies?) in the bedrooms of 365 subjects, and gave them a survey to fill out to determine their health. Since the 365 subjects were randomly selected, it's conceivable that there were some prior medical conditions and prior opinions on the RF exposure issue, which would certainly appear on the survey. This is hardly a double blind study as all the participants were deemed to have been exposed.
In both groups, well-being and perceived field strength were not associated with actual exposure levels.
In contrast to a recent Dutch study, we could not confirm a short-term effect of UMTS base station-like exposure on well-being.
In other words, there was no effects to RF exposure.
I find the procedure a bit amusing, in that subjects were asked to refrain from taking any medications for 24 hours prior to the test exposure. I'm one various heart meds. If I did that, my BP and pulse would climb, resulting in some minor anxiety effects. No RF required.
3 sessions, of 45 minutes exposure each, is hardly sufficient exposure. However, 10 V/m is not a strong RF field, where 41 V/m at
900MHz is the recommended US max exposure for the general public.
Brain washing might work. Education through advertising perhaps. Maybe throw some public relations money at the problem. In any case "more re$earch is nece$$ary".
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Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558
Imho the most important finding by this study is, that there is a major flaw in common thinking about HF-RF to human influence. The common story goes: "if there is an effect, it can only be thermal by nature". So, once you prove that there is not enough energy to cause any extra heath, you have proven that HF-RF is harmless.
The study shows, that there is a) not enough energy transferred into the study subjects to cause measurable themperature rise. And b) that with statistical significance, some people are able to tell whether a transmitter is on or off. That being the case, there is at least a need for the 'it's-all-harmless-gang' to provide a credible hypothesis for the mechanisme that enables some people to 'sense' whether the transmitter is on or off.
No ! There was no proven harm associated ! That's a totally different matter. This study reproduced the dutch finding: "they know and we cannot explain why" ;-)
I fully agree here. I would have been excluded as a test subject because I drink 4 cups of coffee a day. Also, people with existing RF induced complaints were excluded. That's rather odd as as a layman I would expect some hits, especially within this group :-) (And on a medical note: on one side I can see why they wouldn't accept schizophrenics in this test. On the other hand, I wouldn't at all be surprized if one day they'll find, that the same mechanism gets triggered in humans, by radio waves for some, by hormones or proteines or even spontanious by others.)
Actually, I was referring to the fact that this discussion has nothing to do with sci.electronics.repair :-) Altough a sloppy microwave repairman may think otherwise. (If still able to think at all, that is.)
I think the safest approach is to avoid wireless as much as possible. You know what I did, I made my home network from wireless to wired by running Cat5e cable using a Gigabit Router. We still have 2.4 Ghz but not for video streaming. But no 5 Ghz. I heard from others as well regarding the havocs of 5 ghz band.
Sorry for the delay. Paying work comes first. 89 Pages before my morning coffee. Ugh. Document is locked and cannot be copied, which means I can't cut and paste quotes. Why make it easy? I'm lazy, so I'll paraphrase.
1.1.1 selection of subjects. Half the subjects came from the "Monitoring Network for Environmental Health" database of what appears to be chronic complainers. Lovely. That's like using cancer prone rats for cancer research. It improves the odds of a positive result.
1.1.1 selection of subjects. Subjects with coronary disease and psychiatric illness have been excluded but they didn't measure the blood pressure or heart rate leaving the results to be totally subjective.
1.1.2 Experimental Setup. Oh, this is cute. Since none of the subjects in the non-complaining group B experience any symptoms when exposed to GSM, in order to manufacture valid results, the researchers used the RELATIVE level of complaints between the two groups (A=complainers, B=non-complainers). So, if everyone that isn't hypersensitive feels nothing, the report can still claim a positive result. Nice.
Pg 14 Figure 3.3 shows the antenna arrangement. Note that the monitoring antenna (black blob on the end of a stick) is very close to the antenna. That's wrong. This experiment is suppose to simulate exposure from base stations, not handsets and is therefore using the far field. however, the measuring device is in the near field. It needs to be at least 10 wavelengths away from the antenna in order to get accurate results. At 900Mhz, that would be about 30cm. At
1800Mhz, that would be about 15cm. From the photo, my guess is about
10 cm. A more logical monitoring location would be near the subjects.
Pg 23 is in the middle of a nice review of SAR heating research and methodology. I like this quote: Interestingly, a study by Bernardi[34] showed that the mere presence of a non-transmitting GSM phone made a greater contribution to the temperature increase that occurred than the electromagnetic field. Well yes. Also, locking the subjects inside an anechoic chamber, with a mess of menacing looking antennas, and being asked dumb questions, might also have a similar effect.
Also, SAR measurements were intended to be used for near field handset exposure, not far field cell site exposure. Little of the cranial exposure calculations shown in section 5 are valid for far field exposure.
The procedures, selection criteria, and double bind exposure details appear to be valid and well considered. I have some minor issues with the types of tests and questions asked, but nothing worth detailing.
As near as I can decode the results in 11.5 Pg 59, there was a statistically significant effect with UMTS (2100MHz) exposure with both groups, and nothing else. Oddly, the report complains about the "inadequate" RF exposure procedures employed by other researchers, while I find their monitoring and measuring procedure to be equally poor.
The Conclusions in Section 12 Pg 61 is weird. They found an effect at
2100 Mhz with 'well being' from group A (complainers) and what appears to be me to be inconsistent effects with 900 and 1800 MHz. More simply, they found a correlation at one frequency and both groups, but everything else was just noise. Interestingly, they did NOT find any increase in sensitivity among group A (complainers) as compared to group B (non-complainers). My conclusion is roughly the same as theirs. There MAY BE some correlation, but the results are far from definitive.
Also, since the results were not conclusive and haven't been verified, the "more research is necessary" catch phrase was invoked on Pg 62.
Drivel: I once proposed an experiment for RF exposure. Drag in the usual collection of random bored volunteers and set them up for an RF exposure test. Also, wire them up for an assortment of real time physiological measurements. Have them answer some verbal wellness questions to keep them occupied. After the test, correlate the measurements with the questions and RF exposure. Yes, it's a lie detector test. I did a crude dry run with two friends and found that they were probably lying on about 25% the wellness questions. Since there was no political or financial interest in validating subjective RF exposure test methods, the full test was never performed. For a list of projects that were funded, see:
--
Jeff Liebermann jeffl@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558
In my youngah days, I could sometimes hear the high-pitched whine of television receivers (horizontal scan, right? ~15kHz?). Not any more.
--
The fashion in killing has an insouciant, flirty style this spring,
with the flaunting of well-defined muscle, wrapped in flags.
- Comment from an article on Antiwar.com (http://antiwar.com)
It makes the report interesting to see if the complainers (and what a lot of us would consider nutters) actually CAN sense the EM fields. Pity about the way they test that, and it doesn't really clinch the case when they are just marginally better than the placebo.
text extracted by ghostscript: quote: "The subjects within group B do not experience complaints at any given GSM exposure and at any instance that they are exposed. Therefore it is necessary to perform the study by means of comparing the occurrence of complaints between groups. As elucidated in Chapter 16 of our study protocol [26], we have calculated that with a total sample size of 72 subjects we obtain a power of 80% to find statistically significant results regarding reported complaints between the periods with exposure and without exposure. The proposed sample size of the experiment has been capable of statistically detecting a difference of
5% on the cognitive tests that have been used." end of quote I can't make any sense of this!
From what I can tell, they measured the field prior to the experiment, and use the probe close in just to make sure the system was working:
quote: "Before the experiments, the exposure of 900 MHz GSMfields, 1800 MHz GSMfields and 2100 MHz UMTSlike fields has been defined and verified, as described in Appendix A. The field strength at the location of the subjects has been determined not to exceed 1 V/m. " "To ensure that the prescribed exposure is actually generated, a monitor probe was used for field verification and logging during the measurements. The probe is positioned in front of the antennas. " end of quote
That's probably why heart rate and blood pressure were not used. I'd be kinda irritated, and if a chronic whiner, I'd be REALLY nervous.
Appendix E in the report has a good diagram that summarizes the responses to the "wellness" questions.
here are the wellness questions (translated by google):
1 Dizziness or a sick feeling
2 Fatigue or lack of energy
3 Nervousness
4 Feeling of pressure or tightness in head or body
5 Quick and fast heartbeat without any reason (or pounding stumps)
6 Headache
7 Restlessness or nervousness
8 Chest pain or breathing difficulties or feel not enough air have
9 feel guilty
10 To feel annoyed
11 Muscle Pains
12 Rage
13 Difficulties with clear think
14 Being tense or excited feel
15 mind wanders
16 Parts of the body numbness or tingling feeling
17 Thoughts that do not eliminate pushing his
18 Parts of the body to feel weak
19 Being unable to concentrate
20 Easy your patience losses
21 Easily distracted
22 To feel hostility
23 Little attention
Iteresting that question 1 (dizziness) has such a significant response, double that of the placebo. It does have relevance to the original posters concerns. Questions 3,8,16,18,21 also have high response compared to placebo. Other than q.21, they all refer to physical sensations. What I find odd is that the subject's responses at 2100Mhz are so much stronger than 1800 MHz, even though they claimed to have set the e-field to about 1V/m. Do you think that 20% higher frequency would make so much difference?
15.734 KHz or something like that. When I was about 12, I built a Heathkit FM stereo multiplex adapter. I could hear the 19 Khz pilot tone out of the tweeter. I couldn't figure out why nobody else could.
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# Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
# 831-336-2558
# http://802.11junk.com jeffl@cruzio.com
# http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS
--
The fashion in killing has an insouciant, flirty style this spring,
with the flaunting of well-defined muscle, wrapped in flags.
- Comment from an article on Antiwar.com (http://antiwar.com)
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