THE WORK OF ALLAN H. FREY

In 1960, biologist Allan Frey, then 25, was working at General Electric’s Advanced Electronics Center at Cornell University when he was contacted by a technician whose job was to measure the signals emitted by radar stations. The technician claimed that he could “hear” radar.

Frey traveled to the facility where the man worked and stood at the edge of the radar beam. “And sure enough, I could hear it, too,” he said. “I could hear the radar going ‘zip, zip, zip’.” Frey went on to establish that the effect was real—microwave radiation from radar (and other source) could somehow be heard by human beings. The “hearing,” however, didn’t happen via normal sound waves perceived through the ear. It apparently occurred somewhere in the brain itself, as microwaves interacted with the brain’s cells, which generate tiny electrical fields. Frey proved also that many deaf people and animals could hear microwave radiation. This phenomenon came to be known as the Frey effect, or simply “microwave hearing.”

At that time the U.S. military, which was interested in greatly expanding its use of radar around populated areas, had substantial funding available to investigate the effects of such radiation on health. For the next two decades Frey, funded by the Office of Naval Research and the U.S. Army, was the most active researcher on the bioeffects of microwave radiation in the country. Frey caused rats to become docile by exposing them to radiation at an average power level of only 50 microwatts per square centimeter. He altered specific behaviors of rats at 8 microwatts per square centimeter. He altered the heart rate of live frogs at 3 microwatts per square centimeter. At only 0.6 microwatts per square centimeter, he caused isolated frogs’ hearts to stop beating by timing the microwave pulses at a precise point during the heart’s rhythm. 0.6 microwatts per square centimeter is about 10,000 times less than the amount of radiation an active cell phone would expose a man’s heart to if he carried it in his shirt pocket.

In a study published in 1975 in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Frey reported that microwaves could induce “leakage” in the barrier between the circulatory system and the brain. Breaching the blood-brain barrier is a serious matter. It means that bacteria, viruses and toxins from the blood can enter the brain. It means the brain’s environment, which needs to be extremely stable for nerve cells to function properly, can be perturbed in other dangerous ways. Frey’s method was rather simple: He injected a fluorescent dye into the circulatory system of white rats, then swept the ¬microwave frequencies across their bodies. In a matter of minutes, the dye had leached into the confines of the rats’ brains. Dr. Leif Salford, whose work is also highlighted here, is currently the most active researcher continuing Frey’s pioneering work on the blood-brain barrier.

Articles by Allan H. Frey

HUMAN AUDITORY SYSTEM RESPONSE TO MODULATED ELECTROMAGNETIC ENERGY, 1962
https://journals.physiology.org/doi/abs/10.1152/jappl.1962.17.4.689

HUMAN RESPONSE TO VERY-LOW-FRREQUENCY ELECTROMAGNETIC ENERGY, 1963
https://zoryglaser.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/HUMAN-RESPONSE-TO-VERY-LOW-FREQUENCY-ELECTROMAGNETIC-ENERGY.pdf

BEHAVIORAL BIOPHYSICS, 1965
https://zoryglaser.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/BEHAVIORAL-BIOPHYSICS-1.pdf

BRAIN STEM EVOKED RESPONSES ASSOCIATED WITH LOW-INTENSITY PULSED UHF ENERGY, 1967
https://journals.physiology.org/doi/abs/10.1152/jappl.1967.23.6.984?journalCode=jappl

BIOLOGICAL FUNCTION AS INFLUENCED BY LOW POWER MODULATED EF ENERGY, 1968
https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD0716044.pdf

PULSE MODULATED UHF ENERGY ILLUMINATION OF THE HEART ASSOCIATED WITH CHANGE IN HEART RATE, 1968
https://zoryglaser.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/PULSE-MODULATED-UHF-ENERGY-ILLUMINATION-OF-THE-HEART-ASSOCIATED-WITH-CHANGE-IN-HEART-RATE.pdf

SOME EFFECTS ON HUMAN SUBJECTS OF ULTRA-HIGH-FREQUENCY RADIATION, 1968
https://zoryglaser.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/SOME-EFFECTS-ON-HUMAN-SUBJECTS-OF-ULTRA-HIGH-FREQUENCY-RADIATION.pdf

ELECTROMAGNETIC EMISSION AT MICRON WAVELENGTHS FROM ACTIVE NERVES, 1968
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1367349/pdf/biophysj00698-0063.pdf

EFFECTS OF MICROWAVES AND RADIO FREQUENCY ENERGY ON THE CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM, 1969
https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD0698195.pdf

BIOLOGICAL FUNCTION AS INFLUENCED BY LOW POWER MODULATED RF ENERGY, 1971
https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/AD0716044.pdf

A PSYCHOPHYSICAL STUDY OF THE RF SOUND PHENOMENON, 1972
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235204031_A_Psychophysical_Study_of_the_RF_Sound_Phenomenon/link/5431c5dc0cf27e39fa9f95d7/download

HUMAN PERCEPTION OF ILLUMINATION WITH PULSED ULTRAHIGH-FREQUENCY ELECTROMAGNETIC ENERGY, 1973
https://zoryglaser.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/HUMAN-PERCEPTION-OF-ILLUMINATION-WITH-PULSED-ULTRAHIGH-FREQUENCY-ELECTROMAGNETIC-ENERGY-B.pdf

AVOIDANCE BY RATS OF ILLUMINATION WITH LOW POWER NONIONIZING ELECTROMAGNETIC ENERGY, 1975
https://zoryglaser.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/AVOIDANCE-BY-RATS-OF-ILLUMINATION-WITH-LOW-POWER-NONIONIZING-ELECTROMAGNETIC-ENERGY.pdf

NEURAL FUNCTION AND BEHAVIOR, 1975
https://ehtrust.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/FreyPioneeringPapers.pdf

MOTOR COORDINATION OR BALANCE DEGRADATION DURING MICROWAVE ENERGY EXPOSURE, 1979
https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.3758/BF03329505.pdf

POSSIBLE MODIFICATION OF THE BLOOD-VITREOUS HUMOR BARRIER OF THE EYE WITH ELECTROMAGNETIC ENERGY
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15368378409035971

SCIENCE AND STANDARDS: DATA ANALYSIS REVEALS SIGNIFICANT MICROWAVE-INDUCED EYE DAMAGE IN HUMANS, 1985
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/16070658.1985.11720280

MODIFICATION OF HEART FUNCTION WITH LOW INTENSITY ELECTROMAGNETIC ENERGY, 1986
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/232083331_Modification_of_Heart_Function_with_Low_Intensity_Electromagnetic_Energy

EVOLUTION AND RESULTS OF BIOLOGICAL RESEARCH WITH LOW-INTENSITY NONIONIZING RADIATION, 1988
https://andrewamarino.com/PDFs/MB/MB_Ch23.pdf

IS A TOXICOLOGY MODEL APPROPRIATE AS A GUIDE FOR BIOLOGICAL RESEARCH WITH ELECTROMAGNETIC FIELDS?,  1990
https://cellphonetaskforce.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/toxicology-model-inappropriate-allan-frey-1990.pdf

ON THE NATURE OF ELECTROMAGNETIC FIELD INTERACTIONS WITH BIOLOGICAL SYSTEMS, 1993
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Allan-Frey/publication/14759716_On_the_Nature_of_Electromagnetic_Field_Interactions_With_Biological_Systems/links/5735eba508aea45ee83ca588/On-the-Nature-of-Electromagnetic-Field-Interactions-With-Biological-Systems.pdf

HEADACHES FROM CELLULAR TELEPHONES: Are they real and what are the implications? 1998
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533043/pdf/envhper00526-0027.pdf

ETHICAL QUESTIONS ON THE USE OF MAGNETIC FIELD REPORTS, 1998
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1533116/pdf/envhper00530-0012a.pdf

CAN PUBLIC HEALTH POLICY DECISIONS BE MADE ON THE BASIS OF CURRENTLY AVAILABLE DATA ON ELECTROMAGNETIC FIELD INTERACTIONS WITH BIOLOGICAL SYSTEMS? 1999
https://www.goaegis.com/articles/frey1100.pdf

CELLULAR TELEPHONES AND BRAIN CANCER: Current Research, 2001
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1240326/pdf/ehp0109-a0200b.pdf

OPINION: CELL PHONE HEALTH RISK? Security concerns during the Cold War may have led to the generation of misinformation on the physiological effects of microwave radiation from mobile phones, 2012
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Allan-Frey/publication/303123645_Cell_Phone_Health_Risk/links/5737c4a308ae9f741b2ad6e0/Cell-Phone-Health-Risk.pdf