The Body Electric

Infobox Book
name = The Body Electric: Electromagnetism and the Foundation of Life
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author = Robert O. Becker and Gary Selden
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language = English
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publisher = Harper Paperbacks
release_date = August 5, 1998 (paperback)
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media_type = Paperback
pages = 368
isbn = ISBN 0-688-06971-1
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:"This article is about a science book. See Body Electric for alternative meanings."

"The Body Electric: Electromagnetism and the Foundation of Life" is a book by Robert O. Becker and Gary Selden in which Dr. Becker, an orthopedic surgeon at the time working for the Veterans Administration, describes his research into "our bioelectric selves".

He began by examining why normal bones heal, and then explored the reasons why bones fail to heal properly. In the process he observed several interesting properties of bones and bone growth, proposing that bones are semiconductors and piezoelectric in nature. These tie into the healing process by electrically stimulating bone marrow cells to differentiate into a form of adult stem cells which regrew the bone from within by regeneration. By applying external electrical stimulation in the proper form, he was able to induce bone healing in patients whose bones had failed to heal together.

Later in his research, observing from prior research that silver had been used as an antibacterial material in the past, he used a combination therapy of silver with electrical stimulation (used in this case primarily to drive silver ions further into tissue to enhance its antibacterial action) and observed the desired antibacterial effect. Also observed was that with proper stimulation fibroblasts would dedifferentiate and apparently became able to form new cell types, leading to the possibility of wider uses for regenerative healing in humans and other animals.

From "The Body Electric": "the ('positive silver') technique makes it possible to produce large numbers of dedifferentiated cells, overcoming the main problem of mammalian regeneration - the limited number of bone marrow cells that dedifferentiate in response to electrical current alone. Whatever its precise mode of action may be, the electrically generated silver ion can produce enough cells for human blastemas; it has restored my belief that full regeneration of limbs, and perhaps other body parts, can be accomplished in humans."

Later in the book he explores his concerns with deleterious effects of electromagnetic fields on living organisms.

ee also

* Regeneration (biology)
* Harold Saxton Burr and the L Field