Electromagnetic modulation of biological processes: influence of culture media and significance of methodology in the Ca-uptake by embryonal chick tibia in vitro.

The present studies are aimed at establishing molecular correlations in the interaction of very low frequency electromagnetic fields with biological systems. Ca-uptake by chick embryo tibia rudiment in short-term culture was a useful model. Tibiae of 8- to 10-day-old chick embryos were incubated 60 min in simplified culture media in the presence of 45Ca at 37.5 +/- 0.5 degrees C either inside or outside pulsating electromagnetic fields. Radioactivity count in the medium was the most accurate method for determining Ca-uptake by the rudiment. The effect of the fields on the Ca-uptake depended markedly on the chemical composition of the culture medium: bicarbonate was indispensable; glucose or sucrose was important; phosphate was potentiating; ethanol, Mg2+, and NaF were stimulating. The field had no effect in (a) blank medium without tibia, (b) tibiae that had been altered by fixation with aqueous glutaraldehyde, (c) nonliving artificial systems endowed with great or small ion sorption capacity. The unique bicarbonate effect with living systems and the passive behavior of nonliving ion sorbing systems prompt the suggestion that the electromagnetic field probably couples with specific processes, such as a bicarbonate-dependent Ca2+ ATPase and the active ion transport, at the cell membrane level. The molecular mechanisms remain to be established.