A large and growing body of research shows that weak magnetic fields can significantly influence various biological systems, including plants, animals, and humans. However, the underlying mechanisms behind these phenomena remain elusive. It is remarkable that the magnetic energies implicated in these effects are much smaller than thermal energies. Here we review these observations, of which there are now hundreds, and we suggest that a viable explanation is provided by the radical pair mechanism, which involves the quantum dynamics of the electron and nuclear spins of naturally occurring transient radical molecules. While the radical pair mechanism has been studied in detail in the context of avian magnetoreception, the studies reviewed here show that magnetosensitivity is widespread throughout biology. We review magnetic field effects on various physiological functions, organizing them based on the type of the applied magnetic fields, namely static, hypomagnetic, and oscillating magnetic fields, as well as isotope effects. We then review the radical pair mechanism as a potential unifying model for the described magnetic field effects, and we discuss plausible candidate molecules that might constitute the radical pairs. We review recent studies proposing that the quantum nature of the radical pairs provides promising explanations for xenon anesthesia, lithium effects on hyperactivity, magnetic field and lithium effects on the circadian clock, and hypomagnetic field effects on neurogenesis and microtubule assembly. We conclude by discussing future lines of investigation in this exciting new area of quantum biology related to weak magnetic field effects.
Magnetosensitivity of amphibian morphological pigmentation is light- and eye-dependent and consistent with the radical pair mechanism
University of Calgary（卡尔加里大学）；Institute for Quantum Science and Technology, University of Calgary（卡尔加里大学量子科学与技术研究所）；Hotchkiss Brain Institute, University of Calgary（卡尔加里大学霍特基斯脑研究所）；Department of Cell Biology and Anatomy, Alberta Children’s Hospital Research Institute, University of Calgary（卡尔加里大学阿尔伯塔儿童医院研究所细胞生物学与解剖学系）
Origin of life from a maker's perspective -- focus on protocellular compartments in bottom-up synthetic biology
Max Planck Institute for Dynamics of Complex Technical Systems（马克斯·普朗克复杂技术系统动力学研究所）；Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya（加泰罗尼亚理工大学）；Queen Mary University of London（伦敦玛丽女王大学）；Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research（马克斯·普朗克聚合物研究所）；Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry（马克斯·普朗克生物化学研究所）
A physicist-friendly primer on the Hamiltonian for quantum sensing in proteins: analytical expressions and insights for a toy model of the radical-pair mechanism
Why Ortho- and Para-Hydroxy Metabolites Can Scavenge Free Radicals that the Parent Atorvastatin Cannot? Important Pharmacologic Insight from Quantum Chemistry
Cryoelectron Microscopy as a Functional Instrument for Systems Biology, Structural Analysis & Experimental Manipulations with Living Cells. A comprehensive review of the current works
