Sleep latency in poor nappers under exposure to weak 2-Hz and 8-Hz electromagnetic fields

ABSTRACT

It was hypothesized that human sleep might respond to the fields emitted by such natural sources as magnetic activity of the sun and the earth’s magnetic fields. However, the experiments aimed on testing this hypothesis remain scarce. Previously, we found an increase in the amounts of stages N2 or N3 during napping of good sleepers under exposure to low-level (0.004 μT) electromagnetic fields of frequencies 1 Hz or 2 Hz. It remains unexplored whether these fields might additionally decrease latency to stage N1. In this study, we selected 13 people with falling asleep problems to examine the effects of low-level electromagnetic fields on sleep latency. Sleep of these study participants was polysomnographically recorded during three 50-min afternoon napping attempts, either with exposure to either 2 Hz/0.004 μT or 8 Hz/0.004 μT electromagnetic fields or without exposure. We did not find that the sham exposure differed from the 2 Hz and 8 Hz exposures in latency to N1, while latency to N2 after the sham exposure was even shorter than after either the 2 Hz or 8 Hz exposure. We concluded that, although the effects of tested fields might be beneficial for sleep intensity (e.g., due to prolongation of N3), they might not be additionally effective against the falling asleep problems.

KEYWORDS:

• Extremely low-frequency electromagnetic fields
• EEG spectrum
• sleep latency
• sleep stages

Acknowledgments

The authors are very grateful to Dr. Dmitry S. Sveshnikov from the Department of Normal Physiology, Medical Institute of the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia, Moscow, Russia and Ekaterina V. Tiunova and Irina A. Piletskaya from the Moscow State Pedagogical University, Moscow, Russia for their help in conducting the nap study. They also thank the unpaid volunteers for their participation in the study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in the studies were in accordance with the ethical standards of the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. The protocols of the studies were approved by the Ethics Committee of the Institutes (#2 from 03.06.2019). Each participant of the experimental study was informed in detail about all procedures and gave his/her written consent.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by the RFBR (grant number 19-29-06071 for O. N. Tkachenko). and funds within the state assignment of Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation for 2021-2023.