Re: How long would it take to do an experiment on the growth of Algae cells??

Jes:

You've asked several questions here, so my answer must be in several parts.

First, there is no such thing as "an electromagnetic field". There are many different kinds of fields, and they have very different biological effects:

• Static fields: The Earth, and the magnets on your refrigerator door, produce a static magnetic field. Some types of animals may be able to use these fields for navigation, but other than that they don't do much of anything to plants and animals. These static fields can interfere with computers.
• Power-frequency fields: Power lines and electric appliances produce alternating current magnetic fields. If these fields are very strong they can injure plants and animals.
• Radio-frequency fields: Cell phones, radio/TV broadcast antennas, fire and police radios, and microwave ovens produce radio-frequency electromagnetic fields (and electromagnetic radiation). If they are strong enough they can cause plants and animals to get hot, and that can injure them.

In practice, except for the use of a microwave oven, you are not going to be able to produce any kind of field strong enough to affect algae growth without considerable expense and potential danger to yourself. The danger is that while the fields might not affect algae growth, the equipment needed to produce a strong field will pose electrical and other dangers of its own.

Finally, how you measure the field depends on what kind of field it is. I use different types of instruments for each type of field. The instrument I use to measure power-line fields is fairly cheap and easy to use, the instruments for static fields and RF fields are more expensive and are not very easy to use.

If you want to know more about different kinds of electromagnetic fields and what they do, I would suggest you look at this part of our website.

John Moulder
Radiation Biologist
Medical College of Wisconsin