Apoptosis of tumor cells induced by weak electromagnetic fields in vivo

In order to study the possibility of apoptosis of tumor cells induced by weak EMFs in vivo, mice were inoculated with Ehrilich ascites cells and exposed to an electromagnetic field (1 mT, 700 K Hz) for a long term. During the treatment growth curves of mice were measured. Comparisons have been made between the growth curves of treated and sham treated mice. After the treatments, apoptosis of Ehrilich ascites cells from treated and sham treated inoculated mice was analyzed by several methods, including flow cytometry, fluorescence microscopy and DNA gel electrophoresis. The results show that the apoptotic ratio of cells from treated cancer mice was significantly higher than those from sham treated mice( P<0.05) and the growth curves of cancer mice deviate from the theoretical curve of healthy mice but tend to it by the EMF treatments. The mechanism of the apoptosis induced by weak EMFs has been discussed in terms of interactions between external electromagnetic fields and DNA.