Bologna cell phone study. (Europe).

Though scientists have largely concluded that radiation from cell phones poses no direct threat to human health, a new Italian study suggests that 900-megahertz radio waves may encourage existing tumors to grow.

Biologist Fiorenzo Marinelli of the National Research Council in Bologna presented results of his team's study in November at a scientific workshop in Greece. Marinelli exposed leukemia cells to cell-phone band radiation at a power level of 1 milliwatt and examined the activity of a gene that controls apoptosis, or normal cellular self-destruction. 24 hours of exposure apparently turned on many cells' "suicide genes," but another day's exposure activated other genes that prompt cell division, thus offsetting the effects of the apoptosis gene.

Cell phone radiation carries insufficient energy to break chemical bonds, and so most scientists had dismissed the appliances as unlikely carcinogens. Some are as yet unpersuaded by Marinelli's study. David de Pomerai of the University of Nottingham told New Scientist that while the new work was intriguing, "I'm far from convinced that these authors are looking at any reproducible and real phenomena."--New Scientist, October 24