dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaMolecular gyroscopes and biological effects of weak ELF magnetic fields
| Authors | V. N. Binhi, A. V. Savin |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | physics/0205008 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0205008 |
| DOI | 10.1103/PhysRevE.65.051912 |
Abstract
Extremely-low-frequency magnetic fields are known to affect biological systems. In many cases, biological effects display `windows' in biologically effective parameters of the magnetic fields: most dramatic is the fact that relatively intense magnetic fields sometimes do not cause appreciable effect, while smaller fields of the order of 10--100 $\mu$T do. Linear resonant physical processes do not explain frequency windows in this case. Amplitude window phenomena suggest a nonlinear physical mechanism. Such a nonlinear mechanism has been proposed recently to explain those `windows'. It considers quantum-interference effects on protein-bound substrate ions. Magnetic fields cause an interference of ion quantum states and change the probability of ion-protein dissociation. This ion-interference mechanism predicts specific magnetic-field frequency and amplitude windows within which biological effects occur. It agrees with a lot of experiments. However, according to the mechanism, the lifetime $\Gamma^{-1}$ of ion quantum states within a protein cavity should be of unrealistic value, more than 0.01 s for frequency band 10--100 Hz. In this paper, a biophysical mechanism has been proposed that (i) retains the attractive features of the ion interference mechanism and (ii) uses the principles of gyroscopic motion and removes the necessity to postulate large lifetimes. The mechanism considers dynamics of the density matrix of the molecular groups, which are attached to the walls of protein cavities by two covalent bonds, i.e., molecular gyroscopes. Numerical computations have shown almost free rotations of the molecular gyros. The relaxation time due to van der Waals forces was about 0.01 s for the cavity size of 28 angstr\"{o}ms.
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"abstract": "Extremely-low-frequency magnetic fields are known to affect biological\nsystems. In many cases, biological effects display `windows\u0027 in biologically\neffective parameters of the magnetic fields: most dramatic is the fact that\nrelatively intense magnetic fields sometimes do not cause appreciable effect,\nwhile smaller fields of the order of 10--100 $\\mu$T do. Linear resonant\nphysical processes do not explain frequency windows in this case. Amplitude\nwindow phenomena suggest a nonlinear physical mechanism. Such a nonlinear\nmechanism has been proposed recently to explain those `windows\u0027. It considers\nquantum-interference effects on protein-bound substrate ions. Magnetic fields\ncause an interference of ion quantum states and change the probability of\nion-protein dissociation. This ion-interference mechanism predicts specific\nmagnetic-field frequency and amplitude windows within which biological effects\noccur. It agrees with a lot of experiments. However, according to the\nmechanism, the lifetime $\\Gamma^{-1}$ of ion quantum states within a protein\ncavity should be of unrealistic value, more than 0.01 s for frequency band\n10--100 Hz. In this paper, a biophysical mechanism has been proposed that (i)\nretains the attractive features of the ion interference mechanism and (ii) uses\nthe principles of gyroscopic motion and removes the necessity to postulate\nlarge lifetimes. The mechanism considers dynamics of the density matrix of the\nmolecular groups, which are attached to the walls of protein cavities by two\ncovalent bonds, i.e., molecular gyroscopes. Numerical computations have shown\nalmost free rotations of the molecular gyros. The relaxation time due to van\nder Waals forces was about 0.01 s for the cavity size of 28 angstr\\\"{o}ms.",
"arxiv_id": "physics/0205008",
"authors": [
"V. N. Binhi",
"A. V. Savin"
],
"categories": [
"physics.bio-ph",
"q-bio"
],
"doi": "10.1103/PhysRevE.65.051912",
"title": "Molecular gyroscopes and biological effects of weak ELF magnetic fields",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0205008"
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