system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
I sat in disbelief as my physics professor told the class that cell phones emit EM waved that will fry your brain because they are the same thing as microwaves and UV waves. Was he BS'ing or am I just terribly misinformed?

Radio waves (and microwaves for that matter) are non ionizing right? And any microwaves being emitted by a cell phone are insignificant, right?

EDIT: There are way more comments than I have time to reply to, so here’s some general info.

1. This professor is actually incredibly smart, and one of the best teachers I’ve had. So he’s not an idiot.

2. I am sure this is what he said. There is a reason I had a look of disbelief, and its not because I was shocked to hear what he said was true. I was appalled that he would make this up. I just wanted to ask some experts to be sure.

3. The general consensus seems to be, surprise surprise, he was wrong.

4. I will ask him about it tomorrow. He likes to joke around a lot, so it may have been a poor attempt at humor. Everyone in the class believed him except for me.
gpt
You're correct; (Edit: The poster, _not_ the professor's assertion, since some people apparently don't read more than the title) Cell phones emit in the microwave region, which is non-ionizing.

UV is also non-ionizing, but have far more energy. Enough to excite electrons in many organic compounds, which causes chemical reactions. (Most notably, DNA damage through neighboring thymine bases reacting with each other)

There are some plausible but unlikely ways microwaves _might_ cause damage, but little reason to think that it'd be significant at those low intensities. (And no solid empirical evidence that cell phone radiation is harmful at all) Fundamentally though, microwaves can't really do any damage that heat in general doesn't do.