DYNAMIC CHARACTERISTICS OF MEMBRANE IONS IN MULTIFIELD CONFIGURATIONS OF LOW-FREQUENCY ELECTROMAGNETIC-RADIATION

We seek to extend the recent suggestion that classical cyclotron resonance of biologically important ions is implicated in weak electromagnetic field-cell interactions. The motion of charged particles in a constant magnetic field and periodic electric field is examined under the simplifying assumption of no damping. Each of the nine terms of the relative dielectric tensor is found to have a dependence on functions that include the factor (.omega.2 - .omega.2B)-1, where .omega.B is the gyrofrequency. We also find a plasmalike decomposition of the electric field into oppositely rotating components that could conceivably act to drive oppositely charged ions in the same direction through helical membrane channels. For weak low-frequency magnetic fields, an additional feature arises, namely, periodic reinforcement of the resonance condition with intervals of the order of tens of msec for biological ions such as Li+, Na+, and K+.