engleski

Oxidative stress in workers occupationally exposed to microwave radiation

It is already known that aging, several diseases (such as Alzeimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, syndrome of Down) and the exposure to various toxic substances and radiation increase production of reactive oxygen species (ROS). The increase of ROS may cause oxidative stress thus disturbing the metabolism of macromolecules (lipids, proteins, and DNA). Data on oxidative stress in humans exposed to microwave radiation are rather scarce. In our preliminary study the concentration of malondialdehyde (MDA) and glutathione (GSH) was measured in blood of eight control volunteers and in 28 workers professionally exposed to microwave radiation. Workers were exposed to GEM radar equipment within microwave field of 10  W/cm2 to 10 mW/cm2 with the frequency range of 1.5 to 10.9 GHz. The concentration of MDA was measured using high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with UV-VIS detector. The mobile phase consisted of 50 mM KH2PO4 and methanol (60:40 v/v). Detector wavelength was set at 532 nm. MDA was separated on C-18 analytical column. The concentration of GSH was measured spectrophotometrically at 412 nm. The concentration of MDA in microwaves exposed group (3.17 1.92 pmol/mg prot.) was significantly higher than in controls (1.74 0.27 pmol/mg prot.) (P<0.05). The GSH concentration in exposed group (0.53 0.18  g/mg prot.) was significantly lower than in controls (1.23 0.28  g/mg prot.) (P<0.05). The increased concentration of MDA and the decreased GSH concentration indicate that the exposure to microwave radiation increase oxidative stress.

microwave radiation ; reactive oxigen species ; malondialdehyde ; glutathione

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