Maxwell's Silver Hammer 285
fields as weak as 0.0035 volts per centimeter, roughly equivalent to the
field from a color TV set 60 feet away.
One of the most telling tests was a simple one done at the Navy's
Pensacola lab. R. S. Gibson and W. F. Moroney measured people's
short-term memory and their ability to add sets of five 2-digit numbers
in the presence of a 1-gauss magnetic field—-the strength found near
some high-voltage power lines and many common high-current ap-
pliances, such as portable electric heaters. Test scores declined at both
the 60-hertz power frequency and the 45-hertz frequency of the San-
guine-Seafarer antenna, but remained normal in control sessions.
Several studies on both sides of the Iron Curtain have found that rats
are generally less active and less exploratory of their environment after
being dosed with microwaves, although some frequencies induce rest-
lessness. In contrast, ELF magnetic or electric fields almost always pro-
duce hyperactivity and disturbed sleep patterns in rats.
Obviously the subtle workings of the mind may undergo many shifts
that don't show up in these crude behavioral tests. Most of our knowl-
edge of electropollution's effects on the brain concerns variables that can
be more easily quantified, such as changes in biochemistry, cells, and
EEG patterns. These studies can't be easily related to changes in thought
processes, but most of the results fit in well with the stress response.
In 1966, Yuri Kholodov found effects on rabbits' EEGs from a few
minutes' exposure to fairly strong steady-state magnetic fields (200 to
1,000 gauss). As we'd found in salamanders, there were more delta
waves, as well as bursts of alpha waves. He and another Russian bio-
physicist, R. A. Chizhenkova, also noted a desynchronization, or abrupt
shift in the main EEG rhythm, for a few seconds when any field was
switched on or off. The same effect has since been confirmed in rats with
microwaves. This proved that the brain could sense the field, whether
the animal knew it or not.
The sites of the greatest changes—the brain's hypothalamus and cor-
tex—were cause for concern. The hypothalamus, a nexus of fibers link-
ing the emotional centers, the pituitary gland, the pleasure center, and
the autonomic nervous system, is the single most important part of the
brain for homeostasis and is a crucial link in the stress response. Any
interference with cortical activity, of course, would disrupt logical and
associational thought.
In 1973 Zinaida V. Gordon, a pioneer in microwave research working
with M. S. Tolgskaya at the USSR Academy of Medical Sciences Insti-
tute of Labor Hygiene and Occupational Diseases, reported a possible
cellular feature of EMR stress. Low doses of microwaves, a mere 60 to