Bob Park and the Mobile Phone. (January 11, 2009)

Robert Lee Park is emeritus professor of physics at the University of Maryland, College Park and is a former Director of Public Information at the Washington office of the American Physical Society. He has been a vigorous opponent of pseudoscience for many years and although now in his late seventies has lost none of his zeal or perspicacity.

Here's what he's had to say last week on the issue mobile phone radiation causing brain cancers:

CELL PHONES: KEEP YOUR HEAD OUT OF THE MICROWAVE OVEN.

Several readers admonished me for my unqualified assertion in last week's WN that "cell phone radiation does not cause cancer." They point out that microwave photons may not eject photoelectrons but they do excite molecular vibrations (heat). That's why your microwave oven has a safety interlock on the door. So does the miniscule energy deposited by the cell phone cook your brain? No! Rapid blood circulation keeps the brain temperature at that of the blood, which is regulated by the hypothalamus at the base of the brain. Thermoregulation is a high priority for the brain. That’s why marathoners run hard for more than two hours, often hatless beneath a midday summer sun, yet their rise in blood temperature is about that of a mild fever.