On the use of the boundary element analysis in bioelectromagnetics Dragan Poljak a,n , Damir Cavka a , Hrvoje Dodig b , Cristina Peratta b , Andres Peratta b a Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture, University of Split, Ruđera Boškovića 32, 21000 Split, Croatia b Wessex Institute of Technology, Ashurst, Southampton SO40 7AA, United Kingdom article info Article history: Received 8 December 2013 Accepted 27 February 2014 Keywords: Boundary element analysis Electromagnetic fields Human exposure Realistic models Induced current density Specific absorption rate (SAR) abstract The paper reviews a boundary element analysis of the human exposure to electrostatic, low frequency (LF) and high frequency (HF) electromagnetic fields. The formulation for the low frequency exposures is based on the quasi-static approximation and the related Laplace equation form of the continuity equation. The assessment of high frequency exposures is based on the Helmholtz equation. The solution of the governing equations is carried out using certain boundary element procedures. Some illustrated computational examples are related to the human head exposed to electrostatic field from video display units (VDUs), pregnant woman/foetus exposure to extremely low frequency (ELF) fields from power lines and the human eye exposed to high frequency (HF) electromagnetic radiation. & 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Contents 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................... 1 2. Theoretical dosimetry basics ............................................................................................. 2 2.1. Exposure to low frequency fields ................................................................................... 2 2.2. Exposure to high frequency fields .................................................................................. 2 3. Exposure to VDU electrostatic field ....................................................................................... 2 3.1. Boundary element solution ........................................................................................ 3 3.2. Numerical results and computational aspects ......................................................................... 3 4. Exposure of pregnant woman/foetus to LF fields ............................................................................. 6 4.1. Boundary element solution ........................................................................................ 7 4.2. Numerical results and computational aspects ......................................................................... 8 5. Exposure to hf electromagnetic radiation: human eyes exposed to plane wave .................................................... 9 5.1. Boundary element solution ....................................................................................... 10 5.2. Numerical results and computational aspects ........................................................................ 11 6. Conclusion .......................................................................................................... 12 References .............................................................................................................. 12 1. Introduction The enormous growth of modern power and communication systems in modern society has increased the public concern regarding possible health risk due to exposure to electromagnetic fields generated by these systems. A comprehensive view to the subject could be found in many review papers, e.g. [1,2]. On the other hand, human being is a rather complex structure to analyze as measurement of induced currents and fields in the body in a realistic scenario is not possible. Consequently, regarding measurements of relevant elec- tromagnetic quantities, the phantoms having some electrical parameters corresponding to humans are often used [3–5], while the theoretical dosimetry procedures for the human expo- sure assessment are related to the use of sophisticated numerical methods [6–8]. Contents lists available at ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enganabound Engineering Analysis with Boundary Elements http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enganabound.2014.02.008 0955-7997/& 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. n Corresponding author. Tel.: þ385 914305698; fax: þ385 21305776. E-mail address: dpoljak@fesb.hr (D. Poljak). Please cite this article as: Poljak D, et al. On the use of the boundary element analysis in bioelectromagnetics. Eng. Anal. Boundary Elem. (2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enganabound.2014.02.008i Engineering Analysis with Boundary Elements ∎ (∎∎∎∎) ∎∎∎–∎∎∎