J.V. Igolkina, E.I. Sarapultseva

Earlier, we found the reduction of spontaneous motor activity (SMA) infusoria Spirostomum ambiguum Ehrbg after exposure to microwave radiation with different duration (from 45 min to 10 h) with 10 GHz. We examined whether the negative effect persists through generations of infusoria. This is important from the standpoint of risk to the investigated representative of the biota and ecosystems in general. We irradiated with low-intensity MW-range at a frequency of 10 GHz with flux density of energy of 10 μW/sm2 with exposures of 1 - 10 hours. We estimated the changes in SMA by the number of crossings of each spirostoma from irradiated and control groups viewfinder eyepiece of the microscope during 1 min immediately after irradiation and after 4, 14, 21 and 30 days. We have been conducted 3-5 series of experiments by using 20 spirostoma in control and 20 with each exposure in each experiment. It was carried out statistical processing of data. We found that the negative effect of decreasing the SMA, which appeared immediately after microwave irradiation in all investigated exposure, persists for 30 days. Thus, the protozoa inherit this effect in asexual reproduction. We traced the effect in 10 - 15 generations spirostom. The effect is not dependent on exposure to the microwave field and covers all individuals in a population. The negative effects in the protozoa at low microwave irradiation in the early period after them and irreversible transfer of these effects at the cellular generation excludes mutations. We assume that one possible mechanism is the impact of structural changes in the protozoa. These changes are the basis of epigenetic inheritance. Our re-sults allow us to propose the hypothesis that low intensity microwave radiation is an environmental hazard for the biota. This issue requires further research.