# Ramazzini Institute far-field base-station exposure study (2018)

> A lifespan rat study at far-field, base-station-like levels reported the same rare heart schwannoma signal as the NTP study, at much lower exposure intensities.

- Canonical URL: https://emfbase.com/studies/ramazzini-2018-base-station-rfr
- Collection: Research record
- Record id: `studies:ramazzini-2018`
- Status: verified
- Last verified: 2026-08-12
- JSON: https://emfbase.com/api/studies/ramazzini-2018-base-station-rfr

## Key values

- **Authors:** Falcioni L, Bua L, Tibaldi E, et al. (Ramazzini Institute)
- **Year:** 2018
- **Design:** animal
- **Exposure studied:** Far-field 1.8 GHz GSM at whole-body SAR of 0.001–0.1 W/kg, 19 hours per day from prenatal life to natural death
- **Place in the evidence base:** moderate
- **Primary document:** https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29530389/

## Finding

A statistically significant increase in heart schwannomas in male rats at the highest dose, concordant in tumour type with the NTP findings despite far lower exposure.

## What it cannot establish

Effect was confined to male rats at the highest of three levels, with small numbers of affected animals. Historical-control comparisons and statistical approach have been contested. Concordance with NTP strengthens the signal but neither study establishes a human risk.

## Related records

- [NTP rodent carcinogenicity studies of cell phone radiofrequency radiation (2018)](https://emfbase.com/studies/ntp-2018-cellphone-rfr): Two-year whole-body exposure studies found clear evidence of malignant schwannomas of the heart in male rats at exposure levels above the human whole-body limit, with no such finding in female rats or in mice.

## Sources

- `ramazzini-2018` Environmental Research (Ramazzini Institute) (2018). *Report of final results regarding brain and heart tumors in Sprague-Dawley rats exposed from prenatal life until natural death to mobile phone radiofrequency field representative of a 1.8 GHz GSM base station environmental emission*. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29530389/ — peer-reviewed, link checked 2026-08-12

Data licence: CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Dataset version 2026.08.1. Retrieved from EMFBase, https://emfbase.com.

This record is reference data, not medical or legal advice. Regulatory limits, scientific guidelines and precautionary values are labelled separately and answer different questions.