Human subjects exposed to a specific pulsed (200 mu T) magnetic field: effects on normal standing balance

Static and time-varying magnetic fields have been shown to alter animal and human behaviors, such as directional orientation, learning, pain perceptio n (nociception or analgesia) and anxiety-related behaviors. Human volunteer s (12 male, 12 female, 18-34 years old) stood on a force plate while within three square magnetic field coil pairs (2, 1.75 and 1.5 m) arranged orthog onal with the uniform magnetic field volume centered at head level. Analysi s of the data shows a significant improvement of normal standing balance or center of pressure, with eyes open or eyes closed, by a specific pulsed 20 0 muT(pk) magnetic field (PEMF). There was no significance found in control condition testing, such as sham-sham exposure of subjects or sham/PEMF exp osure of a 60 kg saline phantom. There were no significant effects of gende r or age. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.