A Wire Patch Cell Exposure System for in vitro Experiments at Wi-Fi Frequencies

In order to study possible biological effects of electromagnetic (EM) fields generated by Wi-Fi devices, an exposure system based on a Wire Patch Cell (WPC) has been designed, fabricated and fully characterized. The system is suitable to expose, in the whole band of the Wi-Fi signal, cell monolayers plated on the bottom of four 35-mm Petri dishes, filled with 2 or 3 mL of biological medium. Results of numerical and experimental characterization indicate quite good efficiency values, with acceptable homogeneity of the dose. Being an open system, the WPC needs a shielding arrangement when placed inside the incubator during the experiments. It has been proven that this arrangement effectively shields the incubator and does not modify the scattering parameter S₁₁ of the structure.