A lifelong question will be answered today! And no, god doesn’t exist, earth is round and yes we did land on the moon. Bug off you fake illuminatis.
So now to the lifelong answer to the question. And some of you might be wondering well he just did! “buzzer goes aaHHHHH”. Now the real question is what is the real question?
No matter if you’re a fake illuminati or a real one, a westerner or an equivalent genius Asian counterpart, no matter your religion, your color or mom’s spaghetti, pretty sure, you must’ve owned a microwave or are still owning at certain point in time. Well, they say time’s relative, so must be your microwave. Does that mean your microwave has a certain speed limit or is your microwave the thing responsible for keeping the whole universe in place together or is your microwave another dimension! We’ll never know. Another MICRO-STEIN is needed.
But there are certain things that we must know. Like is your mama fat or is anybody in your family is fat, be like genuinely concerned. “HEALTH IS WEALTH” as I said it in the previous post.
Jokes aside, To the genuine portion, the lifelong question, is microwave radiation harmful and causes cancer?
Before we get into this cancer thing, first, we should have some knowledge about various things related to microwave oven. Like what is a microwave oven, it's basic working principle and types of radiation and what these types of radiation do to the human body.
What is a Microwave?
The name microwave comes from an electromagnetic wave with a wavelength in the range 0.001-0.3 m, shorter than that of a normal radio wave but longer than those of infrared radiation.
Microwave Oven
And a microwave oven is a kitchen appliance that heats and cooks’ food using microwave. This causes the polar molecules in the food to rotate and produce thermal energy in a process known as dielectric heating.
For Detail Explanation as to how a microwave oven cooks' food, here's the link. Also included in the reference section.
Now about the radiation, types of radiation devised on the basis of energy, whether or not they can knock an electron of an atom or a molecule, can be devised into two basic categories.
1) Ionizing radiation:
- Type of radiation, having enough energy to liberate electrons from atoms or molecules, thereby ionizing them.
- The gamma, X and beta rays all fall under this category.
- Since these radiations can knock a code out of the DNA, thereby changing the structure, are CANCER causing, i.e. are able to produce mutating cells.
- By this I don’t mean to imply to stop doing X-Rays all together. Our body can withstand up to a certain limit, before it becomes lethal. So, for an X-ray machine to cause cancer, you’ve to get exposed to it like every day for the next two years or even more.
- So the benefits outweigh its disadvantages.
- Don’t get alarmed just because you got exposed to X-rays like 8 or 10 or 20 times in a year. The dose is very minimal and is usually considered safe.
Here lies the answer,
2) Non-Ionizing radiation:
- Low energy level radiation type, cannot knock an electron from an atom or a molecule. So they can’t alter the genome sequence of the DNA, so are not cancer causing.
- Most non-ionizing radiation, such as radio and microwave energy, is considered harmful only to the extent of the amount of heat energy it transfers to whatever it hits. This is, in fact the way that microwaves cook food.
But UV light is unique, as it is non-ionizing but has the capacity to cause harmful effects similar to what ionizing radiation can create. So the UV repellent creams are not just meant to make you look extremely beautiful or handsome, they’ve a deeper purpose! TO SAVE YOUR SKINNY ASS FROM CANCER.
I couldn’t just resist you know. Started by saying let’s not talk about cancer but talk about the radiations but turns out CANCER AND RADIATION ARE IN-SEPARABLE!
The drama was very short and sweet!
Just because microwave radiations don’t cause cancer doesn’t mean you should stick your head inside it while it’s cooking. It still can cause burns and leave you with tan lines. NO NEED TO GO TO THE BEACH!
Follow the rules and specifications on how to operate, what to do and what not to do. Check for radiation leakage and if the leakage is in excess than prescribed, you know what to do.
References:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave_oven
- How oven cooks food: http://www.explainthatstuff.com/microwaveovens.html
- https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikijunior:How_Things_Work/Microwave_oven