How does a mobile phone work? And is it harmful for the brain?

Do you know that the actual word for a mobile phone or cell phone is cellular radio? In English “cell” means a small section – and for a mobile phone, a whole city is looked upon as a structure of cells with six sides, like a honeycomb. In every cell, there is a transmitter tower that plays the role of connecting people through radio waves. We can better understand this sequence through the following steps: 

working of mobile phone

  1. The driver of the car shown here wants to contact his friend, so he dials the number without stopping the car. He does not know where in the city his friend is.
  2. The telephone instrument transmits the dialed number which the transmitter-cum-receiver (the tower) of that cell catches and sends to the mobile telephone exchange through underground cables.
  3. Now, it becomes the task of the telephone exchange to search for a friend. Hence, it would send the number to transmitters in all the cells. For this, it uses underground cables instead of radio waves. After this, each transmitter has to find out whether the holder of the dialed number is anywhere in the cell. Every transmitter transmits the number through radio waves the very next moment. Now, whichever cell the friend is in, his phone is bound to ring!
  4. The friend is contacted in the cell far away! Though he is journeying several kilometers away in the opposite direction, he gets the call. Conversation can now begin between the two friends!
  5. Here comes the interesting thing. The friend’s car is riding towards the limit of the cell, i.e. the border of the cell. It is clear that the car will cross the border in a while – after that, the transmitter in the original cell will not be able to catch the radio waves of the conversation; nor will it be able to send any. But if the conversation between two persons is cut off in the middle of the conversation, then what is the use of the mobile phone? Hence, as soon as the car crosses the border of its cell, the transmitter hands over the task to the next transmitter. While handing over, if a sentence is unfinished, the remaining words are transmitted by the next transmitter! This transition is done so quickly that the speaker does not even realize that the transmitter is changed.

There are concerns that a mobile phone might harm the brain. While this device does have several benefits, it is true that a phone itself is a transmitter. When held against the ear, the powerful radiofrequency energy and the magnetic field that is created through it may harm the brain. Several studies have been conducted about this danger, and the World Health Organization (WHO) has classified radiation from cell phones as a possible carcinogen. This means that it might increase one’s risk of brain cancer, especially if we use mobile phones consistently in the long term. 

However, the studies on this subject cannot explain just how brain activity is affected by mobile phones. There needs to be more research in this area in order to determine a safe level of exposure.