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Researchers at the University of South Florida found that mice, genetically altered to develop Alzheimer's Disease, benefited from long-term exposure to electromagnetic waves -- such as those emitted by handsets -- allowing them to performed just as well on thinking and memory tests as healthy mice.

"Quite to the contrary, those mice were protected if the cell phone exposure was stared in early adulthood," said Gary Arendash, lead author and University of South Florida professor. "Or if the cell phone exposure was started after they were already memory-impaired, it reversed that impairment."

Arendash's team exposed the mice to cell phone radiation for two hours a day over seven to nine months. They found that beta-amyloid -- a protein that builds up in the brains of Alzheimer's sufferers -- had been lessened in older mice, with improvements and even reversals of their brain pathology.

"The electromagnetic wave prevents the aggregation of that bad protein of the brain," Arendash said. "The findings are intriguing to us because they open up a whole new field in neuroscience, we believe, which is the long-term effects of electromagnetic fields on memory."

In addition, younger mice with no signs of memory loss were protected against Alzheimer's after the exposure.

The results were a major surprise to the researchers and open the possibility of developing a noninvasive, drug-free treatment for Alzheimer's, added Arendash.

"When we got our initial results showing a beneficial effect, I thought, 'Give it a few more months and it will get bad for them,'" said Arendash. "It never got bad. We just kept getting these beneficial effects in both the Alzheimer's and normal mice."

Around 35 million people globally will suffer from Alzheimer's Disease or other forms of dementia this year, according to Alzheimer's Disease International.

There has been recent controversy about whether radiation from cell phones cause brain cancer. In September, the U.S. Senate Health Committee began probing into any potential links between cell phone use and cancer, concerned that the case may be similar to the cigarette-lung cancer connection that was denied by tobacco companies for decades.