A n ew study by the State Institute of Bee Research, University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany , engineered by the Communications Engineering Lab CEL at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology found that there were significant effects on the homing ability of foraging honey bees when long term exposed to frequencies used in Wi-Fi and wireless networks, 2.
No effects were found on brood development or adult worker longevity. Notably the effects on homing behavior were only evident after long-term, not short-term, irradiation. Yet no federal agencies are acting to protect them. Urbanization and the increasing use of wireless technologies lead to higher emission rates of radiofrequency electromagnetic fields RF-EMF in populated areas. This anthropogenic electromagnetic radiation is a form of environmental pollution and a potential stressor on bees or other flying insects.
Cities often have a high density of wireless devices operating on microwave frequencies, which generate electromagnetic frequencies e. To date the effects of nonionizing electromagnetic radiation on the vitality and behavior of insects are poorly understood. In our experiment we used honey bees as model organisms and analyzed the effects of defined exposures to 2.
To generate this radiation, we used a high-quality radiation source which generates a consistent, definable and realistic electromagnetic radiation, engineered for this experiment by the Communications Engineering Lab CEL at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. Our results show significant effects of long-term exposures on the homing ability of foraging honey bees, but no effects on brood development and adult worker longevity.
Using this novel and high-quality technical set-up, this interdisciplinary work provides new data on the effects of these widely used frequencies on important fitness parameters of free-flying honey bees. Facebook Twitter youtube Instagram.
