Microwave ovens do not destroy nutrients | How Microwave Ovens Work
Sep 06 '01 (Updated Nov 22 '02)
The Bottom Line Microwaves are no worse for the nutritional value of your food than red rooms (and much easier to accessorize).
I'm sorry, but I have to post this response to the review posted by nlee31 at http://www.epinions.com/content_2092671108 .
I'm not attempting to be mean or nasty, just informative and correcting the misinformation being presented in that article.
I left comments on the epinion, but the writer was too ignorant and/or misinformed (I'm not being mean), and when I saw that it was the ONLY review in the section I decided I had to post for this reason: parents have more than enough to worry about with a new infant without worrying that they are going to starve their baby by using a microwave.
Radiation
Microwave ovens do not use "radiation" in the common, non-scientific usage of the word. They do use electromagnetic radiation in the scientific use of that term. So do regular ovens, neon signs, the monitor you are reading this on, candles, etc.
The damaging sort of radiation is the result of atoms falling apart or being broken apart and releasing alpha and beta particles and gamma waves. This is nuclear fission. This is the sort of radiation that is used in bombs, power plants, and the like. This is also what makes substances such as plutonium and radon dangerous, these elements spontaneously break down and release damaging waves and particles, and the atoms they break down into may break down further causing more damage (such as with the dangerous "radon daughters"). Irradiating food is exposing the food item to a source of this sort of radiation, which kills any microbes in it and just may cause nutrient breakdown, as well.
There's also the ability to generate those particles while combining atoms into larger atoms, such as is in the sun. This is nuclear fusion.
Something that is radioactive (plutonium) is something that will break down and give off these rays and particles, but something exposed to these will not be radioactive, just irradiated, you would have to allow the plutonium to be absorbed directly into the food item for the food item to be tainted with radioactivity.
Not all radioactive elements are greatly dangerous. Nearly every smoke detector in your house has a radioactive element in it (usually Americanium). *
Now, electromagnetic radiation is the total spectrum of wave/particle energies, which includes those rays and particles, as well as X-Rays, radio waves, all the frequencies that televisions, cell phones, cordless phones, remote controls use, infrared, what our bodies perceive as heat, what our eyes see as light, and the forces of magnets are part of this spectrum. But the light from your monitor, the heat energy from the room around you, the infrared signal from your remote control, these are not "breaking down nutrients" in your body and tainting you with radiation (though a whole lot of UV radiation can increase your chances, so make sure you always wear sunscreen). And Microwaves are just a special wavelength of this spectrum that have some neat-o properties that make them useful for heating up some substances. They are called microwave ovens because they are using a special wavelength in the band that we called the microwave area which we already were using for communication. The microwave band is between infrared (and what we sense as heat) and UHF, VHF, and FM Radio waves.
How Microwave Ovens Work, Part I An Experiment
Let's build a microwave oven simulator! We'll need a strong wooden box with a clear Plexiglas cover, some sand and clumps of earth, some iron filings, and a big strong electromagnet.
Mix the iron filings (little oblong pieces of iron) into the sand and dirt clumps and put these in the box. Carefully close the clear Plexiglas lid.
Hold the magnet above the box so that the north end of the magnet points north, the sound end points south.
Now, for safety, let's put on some safety goggles. Electromagnets aren't dangerous, but old spatulas are, and just in case there's any old spatula's around, let's wear our goggles.
Turn on the magnet.
Now iron filings that were at the top of mixture in the box should be lined up in 'lines' that look like they run out the top of the north end of the magnet, curve down and run straight up into the south end of the magnet. So the iron filings in the box are trying to align themselves to the polarity of the magnet. And the dirt and sand just sit there, completely uninterested in the magnetic waves passing through them, just as our bodies are not melting and turning into little green puddles.
If we turn the magnet, spinning it so the north end points to the east, we cause all the iron filings in the box to want to turn and keep themselves aligned along the new path of the magnet.
If we were able to spin this magnet (and the magnet was powerful enough) really fast, we would eventually create heat inside the box due to the friction generated by the iron filings spinning around against the rest of the stuff in the box. Probably the edges of the mixture would heat up first because they'd be more exposed to the magnet, and the clumps of dirt wouldn't heat up much, because they'd not have iron filings inside them, only on the edges.
Now we would probably laugh if someone came over and told us that nothing would grow in that sand and dirt, because we'd just destroyed all the nutrients in it with the powerful radiation we wielded in the magnet, wouldn't we? (We might agree that sandy soil with iron filings in it isn't the best potting soil, though.)
How Microwave Ovens Work, Part II Real life
That is basically a big model of the microwave. The iron filings represent water molecules. The sand and dirt clumps represent the other stuff that makes up your food. The big electromagnet is the magnetron in the microwave oven, and the lines of magnetic force represent the 'light' that the microwave shines on the food. This electromagnetic radiation or 'light' is much like the light we see by, but it's of a longer wavelength (like red is longer than blue) that happens to have a special property it's just the right wavelength to cause the water molecules to want to line up with the direction of those waves. Remember, we're not using any radioactive element to create alpha, beta, or gamma rays, we're creating waves just like you do when you turn on a lamp or a computer monitor, sort of like exposing your food to the light from a red room. The light from the red room is electromagnetic radiation that doesn't cause any damage. Microwave ovens are also much easier to accessorize! So, the microwave wavelength causes the water molecules to try to line up with them, and by spinning the source of those waves, we cause the water molecules to spin around and generate heat through friction with the other substances in the food.
This is why we're often told to put some water on food that's a little dry, in order to help heat it up. And the waves have more effect on the edges of the food, just like our electromagnet, because they are stronger there, which is why you can burn the edges of something in the microwave and still have a cold middle if you don't stir and turn it. Like that bowl of Screaming Poet White Chili I 'nuked' last night, the outside rim of the bowl was boiling because it was a thin edge of water, yet the big chunks of chicken in the middle were cold.
A microwave oven might even be better for the nutritional value of your food, because it's not having to transmit the heat energy from a burner or flame through the food edges to the middle of the food. Wouldn't all that 'radiation' travelling through the edges ruin it? If you don't think so, I've got some black pancakes you are welcome to try to eat. Of course all cooking heats up the food and will destroy some nutrients, denaturing proteins and caramelizing sugars, but that is ALL cooking.
Microwave ovens are better for the environment. All the energy is used to heat the food, only, and not the air and the container. Less electricity usage means less pollution for your child to breath later.
The Dangers of Microwave Ovens
An improperly working microwave, or a microwave oven that has been tampered with can be dangerous, just as damage or toying with a gas or electric stove could be dangerous. If you were exposed to the waves coming from a microwave, you would feel heat, not just at the surface, but inside. Areas of the body with good circulation would easily move that heat around your body, but areas like the corneas of the eyes without circulation could quickly be damaged.
This leads into the second dangerous misuse: someone intentionally putting some poor living creature into the microwave. That's just icky, and is also a danger of a regular oven.
Ironically, the one real danger of a properly operating microwave oven is never discussed by our misinformer: You have a higher chance of superheating a liquid. Ordinarily when a liquid heats to boiling temperature, imperfections and contaminants on the container allow 'bubble seeds' to form in the liquid. You notice how bubbles usually form from the same spot in a boiling pan or glass container. Because the microwave is heating it everywhere, it's possible that these steam bubble seeds don't form, and the liquid heats up above the boiling point. So, if your glass pot of water didn't start boiling after the 5 minutes it usually takes, you put it on for another 2 minutes. Then another two. The liquid gets hotter and hotter, and eventually something will start a single seed, sometimes naturally, sometimes when someone reaches is the microwave and grabs the container or drops in a fork, and the entire contents of the container 'explode' and turn to steam. Serious burns can result from superheated liquids exploding. Water that has already been boiled, distilled water, and glass or glazed containers (which have a much more perfect surface) can lead to this condition.
Of course a watchful adult should always supervise children's use of any cooking device, the microwave is no different. Avoid problems of superheating by paying attention and not overheating food items.
Conclusion
Wouldn't it be nice if microwaves DID destroy the nutrients in our food? Everyone worried about eating too much could just 'nuke' their food and still eat a big hearty, tasty meal, but the body wouldn't absorb all that energy to be stored as fat from it!
Microwave ovens work by shaking water molecules, not by destroying nutrients or exposing them to radioactive materials. Please make sure you check the temperature of ANY food you feed your infant so you don't burn their little tongues.
As for the rumors about the unhealthiness of food cooked in a microwave oven, these are simply myths promulgated by people who don't understand what microwaves are and fear them irrationally. --Louis A. Bloomfield, Professor of Physics, The University of Virginia
Don't take my word for it
I may be wrong. I'm just sharing what I learned from Physics 211 several years ago. If anyone who knows more about the physics of microwave ovens would like to correct me, I welcome them to do so, and I will incorporate that new knowledge into this review. I don't want to be misinforming people just because of my own ignorance and a misguided sense of good intentions. Here's some other sources I've discovered, as well:
How Microwave Ovens Work
http//www.howstuffworks.com/microwave.htm
huge FAQ which also mentions the dangers of superheating a liquid
http://rabi.phys.virginia.edu/HTW//microwave_ovens.html
What Are Microwaves?
http//www.gallawa.com/microtech/mwave.html
Science Inside A Microwave Do Not Attempt This At Home
http://home.earthlink.net/~marutgers/fun/microwave/microwave.html
* The smoke detectors in your home have a radioactive element in them. By law, these are not to be discarded by being thrown away into the trash, but returned to the store you bought it from. Unfortunately our sanitary landfills are filled with these radioactive chemicals and incinerators send these chemicals up their smokestacks which really do lead to the contamination of the environment with radioactive chemicals which are bad for your baby. Please dispose of your old smoke detectors in the proper fashion.
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roymeo
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