Effects of high intensity non-ionizing terahertz radiation on human skin fibroblasts

Dmitry S Sitnikov; Inna V Ilina; Veronika A Revkova; Sergey A Rodionov; Svetlana A Gurova; Rimma O Shatalova; Alexey V Kovalev; Andrey V Ovchinnikov; Oleg V Chefonov; Mikhail A Konoplyannikov; Vladimir A Kalsin; Vladimir P Baklaushev

doi:10.1364/BOE.440460

Effects of high intensity non-ionizing terahertz radiation on human skin fibroblasts

Biomed Opt Express. 2021 Oct 26;12(11):7122-7138. doi: 10.1364/BOE.440460. eCollection 2021 Nov 1.

Affiliations

¹ Joint Institute for High Temperatures of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia.
² Federal Research and Clinical Center of Specialized Medical Care and Medical Technologies FMBA of Russia, Moscow, Russia.
³ N. N. Priorov National Medical Research Center of Traumatology and Orthopedics, Moscow, Russia.
⁴ National Research nuclear University MEPhI Obninsk Institute for Nuclear Power Engineering, Obninsk, Russia.
⁵ Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Moscow, Russia.

Abstract

For the first time, the data have been obtained on the effects of high-intensity terahertz (THz) radiation (with the intensity of 30 GW/cm², electric field strength of 3.5 MV/cm) on human skin fibroblasts. A quantitative estimation of the number of histone Н2АХ foci of phosphorylation was performed. The number of foci per cell was studied depending on the irradiation time, as well as on the THz pulse energy. The performed studies have shown that the appearance of the foci is not related to either the oxidative stress (the cells preserve their morphology, cytoskeleton structure, and the reactive oxygen species content does not exceed the control values), or the thermal effect of THz radiation. The prolonged irradiation of fibroblasts also did not result in a decrease of their proliferative index.