Author(s)

C. Gonzalez, A. Peratta & D. Poljak

Abstract

The paper presents a three dimensional BEM model of a pregnant woman and foetus exposed to extremely low frequency electromagnetic fields. In particular, the case scenario solved is focused on the case of exposure to high voltage power transmission lines. The paper presents the corresponding theory, BEM computational implementation, and results. The latter are expressed in terms of current density, potential and electric field in the different tissues. This work is part of an ongoing research whose overall objectives are to provide accurate estimations of fields and induced currents for assessing exposure of human bodies to electro-magnetic fields. Keywords: pregnant woman; boundary element method; electric field. 1 Introduction Exposure levels in the foetus of a pregnant woman are difficult to estimate mainly because of the following three main factors. Firstly, the lack of data on electrical properties at low frequency for the foetus and the surrounding tissues; secondly, the impossibility of collecting in-vivo measurements in a real case scenario; and finally, because of the complicated changing geometrical and physical properties of the body along the pregnancy period. Hence, a numerical modelling approach is highly appealing, especially for conducting sensitivity analysis on the electrical properties, which are scarce and scattered in the available literature. The aim of this paper is to analyse the case of exposure of a pregnant woman to high voltage overhead power-lines by means of a collocation BEM based on an three dimensional anatomical model of the mother and foetus.

Keywords

pregnant woman; boundary element method; electric field.