On November 15th, our group, together with the Society for Light Treatment and Biological Rhythms (SLTBR), the Daylight Academy (DLA), and Luger Research (LR), organised and presented the “deLIGHTed Talks - History of Good Light, Beyond the Visual Spectrum” lectures.
The videos of these lectures are now online, as well as the panel discussion!
Priji Balakrishnan
With a welcome and introduction
Timo Partonen - Full daylight spectrum from a historical perspective
The idea that sunshine is good for us is as old as the human civilisation itself. Heliotherapy used sunlight as medical therapy mainly for rickets and tuberculosis until vitamin D supplementation and antibiotics replaced it. In this talk I shall review the medical basis for current therapies with ultraviolet, visible, and infrared wavelengths. Phototherapy evolved from heliotherapy to apply artificial radiation, with diverse modifications, for treatment of certain skin diseases and cancers. Light therapy of visible light was found effective for treatment of winter depression in the 1980’s. Photobiomodulation emerges from discoveries of laser technology in the 1960’s and applies artificial infrared radiation for reducing pain due to knee osteoarthritis and shoulder tendinopathies for instance.
Anne Berends - Beyond the visible: the proven effects of near-infrared light on health and well-being.
Although 50% of natural sunlight consists of near-infrared light, the health effects of this type of light have long been overlooked in the lighting community. Scientific research since the 1960’s has resulted in a vast body of evidence on the beneficial effects of near-infrared light on a variety of medical conditions, and a recent clinical study shows that also generally healthy people benefit from daily near-infrared exposure. Today, near-infrared light is absent in the indoor environment. In this talk I will highlight the health effects of near-infrared light and discuss the most effective way of bringing near-infrared light into the built environment.
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