, Germaine Cornelissen2 and Franz Halberg2
(1)
Department of Chronomics & Gerontology, Tokyo Women’s Medical University Medical Center East, Arakawa-ku, Tokyo, Japan
(2)
Halberg Chronobiology Center, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA
Abstract
On August 1, 2010, an entire hemisphere of the sun erupted. Filaments of magnetism snapped and exploded, shock waves raced across the stellar surface, and billion-ton clouds of hot gas billowed into space. A coronal mass ejection (CME) headed directly for earth. The huge solar storm triggered unusual northern and southern aurorae appearing on the night of August 3. Geomagnetic turbulence in Japan was observed on August 4. The CME could have driven disastrous flooding occurring in Ladakh on August 5 and 6, 2010, in association with an annual acrophase of environmental temperature recorded by us there.
Chronoecological health-watch in Ladakh, using “glocal comprehensive assessment” to study the human circulation, autonomic nervous system activity, and health quality as a physiological system at high altitude, complements a chronoecological study in Japanese towns. Ladakh is a very arid region of east Kashmir, adjacent to Tibet, at an altitude of 2500–4600 m between the Karakoram and the Himalayan ranges. Ladakh residents were checked out annually from 2004 to 2010.
Space weather affected the citizens’ health, as demonstrated in this investigation, at least around an 11-year cycle. Thus, an astro-glocal assessment, in space and time, is recommended as background for diagnosis and treatment, especially at high altitudes. We can ask whether one of the longer solar, or galactic geological, cycles can override the conditions of the citizens’ health as well as the earth weather especially in Ladakh recorded during the minimum in a Horrebow-Schwabe about 11-year sunspot cycle.
Keywords
Chronoecological health-watchHigh-altitude environmentsHuge solar stormDisastrous floods in LadakhGlocal assessment in space and time22.1 Introduction
Ladakh is one of the most remote regions of India, with the Karakoram to the northwest, the Himalayas in the southwest, and the Trans-Himalayas at its core. A sparsely populated area of Indian Himalaya is here, at 2500–4600 m altitude, consisting mainly of arid desert. High-altitude environments are generally harsh and fragile. They have little oxygen, low pressure, cold temperature, and strong ultraviolet radiation, and the weather in the mountains is very changeable. Certainly individuals living there at high altitude showed changeable SpO2 values as well as severe hypoxemia, to which women seem to be more sensitive than men. Meteorological and broader climatological environments should affect the health of citizens in Ladakh. There have been no precise reports there, however. Thus, we started the weather and climate monitoring and tried to make an interdisciplinary approach for the relation between the mountains’ weather and the citizens’ health.
22.2 Chronoecological Health-Watch in Ladakh
We have continued free health screening of a chronoecological health-watch annually since 2001–2010. The first visit to Ladakh was 2001, coincident with a span of high solar activity, that is in the solar maximum, and the sixth visit of 2008 was close to a solar minimum. Space weather could have a strong effect on the high-altitude environment, and in this investigation we assessed a relation between solar activity and the health of citizens in Ladakh.
A chronoecological health-watch in Ladakh, using “glocal comprehensive assessment (GCA)” to study the human circulation, autonomic nervous system activity, and health quality as a physiological system at high altitude, complements a chronoecological study in Japanese towns. Ladakh is a very arid region of east Kashmir, adjacent to Tibet, at an altitude of 2500–4600 m between the Karakoram and the Himalayan ranges.
In association with the 23rd solar cycle, 3418 Ladakh residents (13–92 years, average 51.4 years of age, 1428 men and 1990 women), i.e., 549 citizens in 2004 (13–82 years, average 51.1 years of age), 461 citizens in 2005 (19–89 years, average 54.9 years of age), 447 citizens in 2007 (20–86 years, average 47.8 years of age), 164 citizens in 2008 (18–92 years, average 55.7 years of age), 788 citizens in 2009 (19–92 years, average 53.1 years of age), 420 citizens in 2010 (in June and July) (19–85 years, average 55.9 years of age), and 589 citizens in 2010 (in August and September) (22–91 years, average 55.7 years of age), were examined annually from 2004 to 2010.
High-altitude environments have generally less oxygen, lower pressure, cold temperature, and strong UV radiation. From June 2009 to September 2011, we monitored the climate at Ladakh, North India (34°27′, 76°49′, 3808 m altitude), every 10 min. Air temperature (°C), relative humidity (%), air pressure (hPa), wind direction (degree), wind speed (m/s), and rainfall (mm) were measured by using a complex sensor (Vaisala CVS-WXT520). Upward/downward long/short wave radiation (W/m2) was assessed by an instrument of Hukseflux CHF-NR01 and UV radiation (305–385 nm, W/m2) by KIPP&ZONEN CUV4 [1]. Rhythmicity and 1/f fluctuations of the time series of measurements were analyzed by the Maximum Entropy Method (MemCalc software Ver2.0, GMS, Tokyo), also investigated in chronomic serial sections with a 24-hour and a separate 7-day cosine fit, by fitting polynomials and by the nonlinearly extended cosinor.
Examinations of health-watch were as follows: pulse oximetry (SpO2), blood pressure (BP), heart rate (HR), respiration rate (RR), and body mass index (BMI). BP and HR were measured twice in each of the sitting, supine, and standing positions using a semiautomated BP device (UA-767PC, A&D Co, Ltd., Tokyo, Japan). Aortic stiffness of cardio-ankle vascular index (CAVI) of right and left ankles [2, 3] was measured twice using a VaSera instrument (Fukuda Denshi, Tokyo). For the glocal comprehensive assessment, we recorded sleep habit, depressive mood questionnaire and cognitive function of the Kohs block design test and the time estimation test. The Up & Go test measured, in seconds, the time it took the subject to stand up from a chair, walk a distance of 3 m, turn, walk back to the chair, and sit down again. Functional Reach, used to evaluate balance, represents the maximal distance a subject can reach forward beyond arm’s length while maintaining a fixed base of support in the standing position. Manual dexterity was assessed using a panel with combinations of 10 hooks (hook-on), 10 big buttons (button-on-and-off), and 5 small buttons (button-on-and-off). The total manual dexterity time in sec., defined as the button score (Button), was calculated by adding the average times for one hook-on and one big or small button-on-and-off.
All data from Ladakh were analyzed with the Statistical Software for Windows (StatFlex Ver.5.0, Artec, Osaka, http://www.statflex.net) and some of these and other data from controls in Minnesota, by methods in the Halberg Chronobiology Center (University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN). Student’s t-tests and one-way analyses of variance (ANOVA) served for the comparison of two or more groups. Significance was considered at p < 0.05.
22.3 Association of Blood Pressure in Ladakh and Solar-Terrestrial Cycle
The first visit to Ladakh was 2001 at the sunspot maximum. From then on, solar activity decreased for 6–7 years and the 23rd solar cycle became the sunspot minimum in 2008. The eighth visit was in 2010 and we have examined citizens in Ladakh from the solar maximum to the minimum (Fig. 22.1).
Fig. 22.1
Solar cycle and chronoecological health-watch in Ladakh. Top: Time series of the solar cycle. Bottom: Timing of eight times of visit to Ladakh for chronoecological health-watch since 2004–2010 (blue ↓), which coincides with the 23rd solar cycle (to December 2007) and with the 24th one (from January 2008). Red ↓ shows the timing of disastrous flooding in Ladakh
Chronoecological health-watch showed a variation of the systolic BP readings as follows: in 2004 (135.1 ± 22.1 mmHg, n = 546), in 2005 (130.6 ± 25.2 mmHg, n = 433), in 2007 (129.4 ± 20.1 mmHg, n = 444), in 2008 (128.8 ± 21.2 mmHg, n = 164), in 2009 (128.0 ± 22.3 mmHg, n = 786), and in 2010 (130.0 ± 23.6 mmHg, n = 418). It was compared with the 23rd solar cycle and their fitted models were surprisingly similar (Fig. 22.2a), yet differing between men and women, with the men apparently resonating with their systolic blood pressure and the women with their diastolic blood pressure (Fig. 22.2b). Systolic but much less so, if at all, diastolic blood pressure was damped when a 1.3-year far-transyear component was no longer detected in the spectrum of the solar wind (4).
Fig. 22.2
(a) Some similarities between systolic blood pressure (SBP) and sunspots. Daily values of Wolf numbers from January 1, 2001, to July 31, 2012, were analyzed by the linear-nonlinear extended cosinor. Using a trial period of 10 years, nonlinearly, the period estimate was about 17 years but converged to 12.58 (95 % CI: 12.17, 12.99) years when adding a second harmonic in the model, as shown here (blue curve). Using a similar model (10-year trial period, with addition of a second harmonic) for the SBP data from Ladakh, the period estimate is about 9.95 years, but the 95 % CIs of the amplitude of both the fundamental and second harmonic cover zero, likely because the time series covers a shorter span of 7 years, shorter than a single solar activity cycle. The dashed red curve was obtained by using the parameters from the linear cosinor corresponding to a trial period of 9.95 years, with the qualification that linearly, the best fitting period is longer than 15 years, as was the case for Wolf numbers in the absence of a second harmonic term. (b) Yearly mean values of systolic and diastolic blood pressure of all Ladakh’s residents as well as of women and men considered separately. Results are shown as bar graphs assigned to the year of data collection, taking into consideration the fact that no data were collected in 2006. This added consideration slightly changes the R^2 values and the equations of the fitted second-order polynomial curves (© Halberg Chronobiology Center.) (c) A plot of an elderly man’s (FH’s) SBP data from 2001 to 2011. The weekly mean values were fitted nonlinearly with a cosine curve using 10 years as a trial period. The model converges to a period of 9.36 years, similar to that found for the residents of Ladakh. There is, however, a large phase difference between the SBP data in Ladakh and those of FH (© Halberg Chronobiology Center.) (d) A plot of a woman’s (GC’s) SBP data from 2004 to 2011 (no data collected between 2001 and 2004). The weekly mean values were fitted nonlinearly with a cosine curve using 10 years as a trial period. The model converges to a period of 11.91 years. The 95 % CI of the period is quite wide in view of the very short span of data available to reach statistical significance (© Halberg Chronobiology Center)
Figures 22.2c, d are from a man and a woman monitored longitudinally in Minnesota during the same or much of the same span. Both individuals (Fig. 22.2c, d) and a population such as that in Ladakh can monitor the sun, but such studies must be extended before drawing comparative inferences. It seems clear, however, that measurements in populations, preferably much longer than that in Ladakh, can mirror solar activity, and hence routine clinic and home measurements may well be tested worldwide for this possible use.
22.4 Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) on August 1, 2010
On August 1, 2010, an entire hemisphere of the sun erupted. Filaments of magnetism snapped and exploded, shock waves raced across the stellar surface, and billion-ton clouds of hot gas billowed into space [4–8]. A coronal mass ejection (CME) headed directly for earth (Fig. 22.3a, b). The huge solar storm triggered unusual northern and southern aurorae appearing on the night of August 3 (Fig. 22.3c). Geomagnetic turbulence in Japan was observed on August 4 and in Canada on August 6 (Fig. 22.3d). The CME could have driven disastrous flooding occurring in Ladakh on August 5 and 6, 2010, in association with an annual acrophase of environmental temperature recorded by us there.
Fig. 22.3
(a) Three-color composite EUV image taken by SDO/AIA at 0600 UT on August 1, 2010. Select field lines are shown on the basis of a PFSS extrapolation for the full-sphere magnetic field B 1. Field line starting points were selected in proportion to the absolute field strength in the full-sphere map at the resolution of the PFSS model; the same starting positions were used in all images and movies in this study. The earth is shown to scale in the lower right corner (Schrijver and Title [4]). (b) A time line of the sun eruption on August 1, 2010, when an entire hemisphere of the sun erupted. Long-range magnetic couplings between solar flares and coronal mass ejections observed by Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and the two STERO spacecraft are summarized in this figure. GOES 1–8 Å light curve for a 2-day interval centered on August 1, 2010; the plot’s vertical scale ranges from the flux levels equivalent to B1 up to C5 (Schrijver and Title [4]). (c) Time series of geomagnetic activity observed in Tromsø, Norway. Please note the long-lasting geomagnetic turbulence, which continued from 16:50 on August 3 to 04:08 on August 5. (d) The huge solar storm triggered unusual northern and southern aurorae appearing on the night of August 3 and also in Canada on August 6. Aurorae happen when energized particles from the sun wash over earth and flow down the planet’s magnetic field lines toward the poles. Along the way, the charged particles bang into nitrogen, oxygen, and other atoms in our atmosphere. The charged solar particles give earth’s atmospheric atoms an energy boost, which then gets released as light, producing the shimmering curtains of greens, reds, blues, and other colors
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