Does shungite EMF protection really work or is it all marketing? Some question the EMF protection industry as a whole, but there has to be something to it, right? As with much of the research here we arrive at an answer neither black nor white.
Mechanistically, shungite’s caged structure could act like a faraday cage, confining the charges. The caged nature of shungite is shown by its nano-onion like particles, layered fullerenes, and zeolite (sponge-like) substructures. From experimental studies on effectiveness of absorbing microwave range electromagnetic radiation, we see that mainly shungite composites combined with other materials gives the best, most reliable, results to date. Indeed, raw shungite is moderately conductive, absorbing and reflecting different frequencies “preferentially”, so the effects of using it depending almost entirely on the shape and angle with respect to the waves desired to be mitigated.
This article is part of a series on shungite, here are the other installments
–> Shungite Overview
–> Shungite with Water
–> Shungite’s magnetism
What exactly is meant by “EMF” – Microwaves vs Radiowaves
Electromagnetic fields are all around us and depending on the wavelength could be in the form of visible light, microwaves, radiowaves, etc. When we speak of EMFs considered potentially harmful we mean anything that couples with subtle electromagnetic fields our bodies produce in such a way that it could be disruptive of metabolism/cellular processes. Aside from coupling, if the power is strong enough the exposure alone can cause tissue damage. These include induced fields from high power AC currents like appliances, and certain configurations of data transmission (i.e. bluetooth).
Here you can see all the frequency bands allocated in the U.S. (between 3000 Hz all the way up to 300 GHz, or 300 billion Hz).
Now if you look on your WiFi router it will tell you the frequency it transmits on. Usually this is 2.4 GHz. This is the same band as microwave ovens work on. But the microwave sends a focused, high power stream of microwave range electromagnetic energy that is stirred in the oven. WiFi sends out a low power radial energy wave from the router. For example, a microwave oven might use 1000 Watts of power while a WiFi router might use 0.1 Watts. The effects aren’t necessarily linear, but still good to know Wifi isn’t exactly cooking us like a TV dinner. Here’s a good guide if you want to know more specifically about how WiFi works.
Harm from Certain EMFs is Really Real
However in cult works that have been well substantiated and referenced, like Invisible Rainbow by Arthur Firstenberg and EMF’d by Dr. Joeseph Mercola, health implications of ordinary data and power transmission is discussed (like power lines and cell data). To get optimal value from this analysis of shungite’s shielding properties you must be motivated to understand that there is every day use cases for shielding. Of course, academic and military use cases will tend to get first dibs on the highly engineered designs, but the concepts still will serve you should you choose to consider them.
If you want some starting points for direct evidence of the detriment of certain EMFs, here are a few strong, recent resources:
Panagopoulos, Dimitris J., and George P. Chrousos. “Shielding methods and products against man-made Electromagnetic Fields: Protection versus risk.” Science of the total environment 667 (2019): 255-262.
Leszczynski, D. (2020). Physiological effects of millimeter-waves on skin and skin cells: an overview of the to-date published studies. Reviews on Environmental Health, 35(4), 493–515. doi:10.1515/reveh-2020-0056
How Might Shungite Provide EMF Protection
Shungite has carbon in many different forms including carbon nanotubes (1D), graphene sheets (2D), and fullerenes (3D). Within and amongst all these forms of carbon we have cage-like structures in between dimensions of forms. On a micro-scopic and nano-scopic level, one may theorize that these structures act like Faraday cages. The semi-conductive nested cages on the size scale of radiowaves absorb the incoming electromagnetic radiation and confer it to the “inner” cage, or next sublevel of carbon structure. This gives shungite EMF protection via radio band absorbency. Here I explain how Faraday cages work.
Now if you are an academic you may be on the verge of rage at how confidently I assert the theory above. In the meat of the article you can see how I came to this conclusion and this is well known to Russian materials scientists. The studies tend to just map the bands and catalog composite characteristics. Particularly we have studies on narrow-band EM absorption in the radio-microwave range. The applications for raw shungite seem very limited. But first let’s sift through some commonly told LIES.
Peek into the budding EMF Protection Market
The problem with the EMF market is that the benefits are poorly measured. Often the only tests done to show “mitigation” of fields is a field strength meter. This tells you the overall strength of the fields but nothing as to the frequency components. The frequency component spectrum would show you the degree of “harmonization” of the offensive fields, but this would certainly require more than a simple multimeter to show.
Most EMF protection companies claim to have patents and few truly do. Some have claimed patents on the basis of technology that has NOTHING TO DO with the products sold. Rather than going into a giant aside I will simply make a separate post, and suffice it to say the only relevant patents I found are EU and Russian patents. US assignees can NOT claim the same features and the best that can be done is the direct entities setting up shop in the States. Igor Serov is the name to look for as the only legitimate body of patentwork I could find, and if you desire you can find brand names from there. Moving on to JUST SHUNGITE EMF protection now.
U.S. Granted Patents involving Shungite EMF protection
Of all of the patents using shungite (raw form), the most extensive use is in composite tensile strength, like in construction. However there is substantial electromagnetic shielding for both radio and microwave electromagnetic fields with COMPOSITE materials.
Absorption into Gigahertz bands shows the potential for general property tuning. Establishing this fact, U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,818,821 B2 and 7,239,261 B2 demonstrate the absorption in the microwave bands using composites rich with high-carbon content shungite.
9,955,870: A tracking bracelet.
This first patent involving shungite EMF protection is a bracelet whose primary purpose is not to protect from EMF. Rather, the inclusion of shielding material is an add-on claim. The add-on claim specifically mentions shungite as a shielding material. This claim prevents any other patent from using shungite as a radio shielding material in this way, as the patent claims prior art. Additionally, U.S. patents can not claim anything disclosed in a Russian or EU patent either.
The composition of the shielding component is not specified beyond containing shungite.
10,615,508: Millimeter WaveShields (Japanese Assignee)
Secondly, the millimeter wave shield patent uses shungite. The assignee is from Tokyo and world patents have also been filed. The invention is a thermoplastic resin with long carbon fibers integrated. It is made specifically for shielding antennae on cars used in newer models with crash detection.
This application is apparently original from the bracelet above, either in configuration or function. Most likely, the bracelet’s shield did not include millimeter wave protection. This antenna patent has the shungite in a composite form that takes the absorption frequency down. You will see the frequency ranges shungite absorbs for below in the science.
10,630,331: WaveShield Specifically for Use for Regular Consumer Electronics
The most recently patented device using shungite is for use with mobile devices. A metal-containing plate attaches to the back of a mobile device and includes a coating to scatter or absorb radio frequency radiation.
It is likely this patent was achieved mainly because of the novelty of the listed options.
There may be patents for shungite EMF protection newer than a year prior to the date of this post. Otherwise this is comprehensive for the U.S. granted patents.
Science of Sungite EMF protection
In Russia, where the effects of EMF are well-integrated into the public lexicon, shungite’s ability to absorb EMF is well documented. Most of the research, in sum dozens upon dozens of peer-reviewed paper, for this shungite series comes out of Russia. Shungite EMF protection is no different.
What we mainly find for raw shungite is an absorption in the higher frequency microwave band, between 29-43 GHz. Wifi, for example is 2.4-5.6 GHz, so would having chunks of raw shungite around your router “do” anything? Answer is maybe, read on to see.
Carbon Structures and Radiowave Absorption Experiments
In 2017 Antonets reported on the 8-70 Ghz band of microwave/radio interaction within shungite. The researchers found that the absorbance and reflectance varied with the carbon content, and that it is best described with a model that takes into account the “percolation” of charge through shungite’s various sized pores. For those who wanna know, the conductivity followed a hyperbolic tangent law, with anomalous features pointing to agreement with a fourth mode excitation theory. Non-linear effects.
They found in a 2021 study that shungite plates with a 10-20 micrometer thickness had better shielding than the 2-3 mm composites previously used. A micrometer is one millionth of a meter, about the size of a human skin cell. The strength of shielding at this thickness is due to the conductive carbon “sponge-like” matrix with dielectric mineral inclusions on the same micrometer size scale.
They found the shungite reflected electromagnetic radiation from 100 kHz to 40 Ghz, and reflected better at the higher frequencies (shorter wavelengths). Different preparation techniques yielded different bands. (This represents wavelengths of 0.0075m-3000m). They found for microwave radiation, carbon contents of 64-95% was optimal. To have the widest bandwidth, 5-34% carbon content was best. When the plate thickness was thicker at 100 micrometers, the reflection efficiency increased to 100% even for lower carbon content.
Additionally, Terukov in 2018 studied paint additive compostites and successfullly absorbed frequencies of 38-43 GHz.
Experiments found Shungite EMF Protection for Organisms
In one study, mice hit with 37 Ghz radiation had less damage to their blood cells when shielded with shungite. (2003, Kurotchenko) In the states, it’s very hard to do a study on EMF protection because the fact that EMF is worth protecting against is still taboo due to industry pressure. Therefore, any vivo experiements are mainly done abroad, and, of course, Russia leads the way for shungite.
More recently, Russian scientists found that if you actually decrease the total shungite in the composite but prepare it in a way with gypsum that increases in conductivity you can replace 40% shungite with the composite and actually double the shielding efficiency. (Moshnikov 2018) Using a base of (separately produced) carbon nano-sructures like nanotubes, and thin metal films, the conductivity was tuned to different frequency-absorbing purposes. Note that after the nano-structures absorb the frequency they do actually emit a modified wave after the fact. So this is the way the waves are said to be “harmonized” or the harmful properties mitigated, so to speak. (Wave goes in, frequency components altered, then relaxes out.)
Should you buy it? How to use
You can put shungite around your office for fun. But if you really want to mitigate WiFi or other offensive frequencies the best choice is still using Ethernet cords and other free ways to reduce EMF. Still, potential harm of having hella shungite around is very low. Otherwise you should get something made by the Russian patents, AiresTech, as they have exclusive rights to the verified technology (but actually do not contain shungite, just use similar properties through lithography on tiny scales). In the near future, shungite EMF protection may come through composite materials, or particular arrangements from certain sources with certain carbon content percentages.
Sources:
Kurotchenko, S. P., Subbotina, T. I., Tuktamyshev, I. I., Tuktamyshev, I. S., Khadartsev, A. A., & Yashin, A. A. (2003). Shielding effect of mineral schungite during electromagnetic irradiation of rats. Bulletin of Experimental Biology and Medicine, 136(5), 458–459. https://doi.org/10.1023/b:bebm.0000017092.52535.f8
Moshnikov, I. A., & Kovalevski, V. V. (2018). Composite materials based on nanostructured Shungite Filler. Materials Today: Proceedings, 5(12), 25971–25975. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2018.08.014
Antonets, Igor V., et al. “Electromagnetic shielding effectiveness of lightweight and flexible ultrathin shungite plates.” Current Applied Physics 29 (2021): 97-106.
Antonets, I. V., et al. “The model presentation of microstructure, conductivity and microwave properties of graphene-containing shungite.” J. Radioelectron 9 (2017): 1-64.
Terukov, E. I., et al. “Radio-wave absorbing properties of polymer composites on the basis of shungite and carbon nanomaterial Taunit-M.” Technical Physics 63 (2018): 1044-1048
Consulted
Xiao, Li, et al. “Antioxidant effects of water-soluble fullerene derivatives against ultraviolet ray or peroxylipid through their action of scavenging the reactive oxygen species in human skin keratinocytes.” Biomedicine & pharmacotherapy 59.7 (2005): 351-358.
Lyn’kov, L. M., T. V. Borbot’Ko, and E. A. Krishtopova. “Radio-absorbing properties of nickel-containing schungite powder.” Technical Physics Letters 35.5 (2009).
Moshnikov, Igor’Anatol’evich, and V. V. Kovalevski. “Electrophysical properties of shungites at low temperatures.” Наносистемы: физика, химия, математика 7.1 (2016): 214-219.
Golubev, E. A. “Electrophysical properties and structural features of shungite (natural nanostructured carbon).” Physics of the Solid State 55 (2013): 1078-1086.
PODOLSKY, VLP, et al. “RUSSIAN JOURNAL OF BUILDING CONSTRUCTION AND ARCHITECTURE.” RUSSIAN JOURNAL OF BUILDING CONSTRUCTION AND ARCHITECTURE Учредители: Воронежский государственный технический университет 3: 74-80.
Pingback: What does Shungite DO? 5 Party Tricks Old Rocks Play