Overcome Your Indoor Existence
What to Focus on When Buying a Red Light
Important Light Therapy Factors
LIGHT THERAPY FOR BEGINNERS
When you can’t get out into the sun, you miss all that good jiu jiu just raining down on you. We evolved under all the colors and spectrum of sunlight. And now we live a mostly indoor life!
We aren’t going to tell you that buying a red light will solve all your problems. We would rather you got out in the morning sunlight. It’s free and everyone has access.
Sunlight contains all the right information to set you up for health and longevity. Photons are tiny packets of information sent from the universe to The Earth. Our skin and eyes take in these photons and unpack the information. We’ve evolved to use solar information as a way to understand where we are on the Earth, what time of year it is and what time of day it is. As we unpack that information processes begin unfolding in our bodies (hormone cascades) that have direct effects on our health.
When we’re outdoors most of the time, our body and eyes correctly interpret this photonic information and we stay healthy. When we’re indoors, and receive photons from man-made devices and lighting, we misinterpret this information and set ourselves up for poorer health.
PBM promises to supplement some of the frequencies of light from the sun that we aren’t getting in our artificial indoor lighting.
Sometimes you have a specific condition and need to supplement with higher doses of vitamins and light is no different. If you truly can’t find a way to get outside, then this is your plan B.
Photobiomodulation (PBM for short) is a way to supplement some of the sunlight we’re missing. All light contains colors, natural and artificial light. We can take advantage of known beneficial colors and reduce known colors that are inappropriate or over-represented in our environment.
Photobiomodulation (PBM) uses either low-level level laser therapy (Laser that doesn't harm the body) or LED lights to produce a desired biological effect. Cases have been made that incandescent light can also be used for photobiomodulation, and this point is contentious, but not totally without merit.
As humans, we’ve evolved to take in the suns rays and use those as information to our cells and brain.
LIGHT IS INFORMATION!
Let that sink in. Light isn’t just light. The type of light you expose yourself to determines your health. Light transmits information to your body. If we forget this, we become sick. We design lighting that costs less money to run, but harms our health. The wrong type of light disrupts animal life. It disrupts our own life. Our bodies were designed to take in light information from the sun and use it to create optimal health.
We can use certain wavelengths of light as supplements to the body, just as we can use oral supplements to help with health conditions.
Light is information. Never forget that.
WHY WE ALL NEED PBM
We now live our lives indoors.
Often we’re only out in the sun for less than a few minutes a day. If you don’t get outside to take a walk during the day you might not be outside at all!
Indoor living takes a toll on the body.
Indoor Lighting is Toxic!
Indoor lighting from LEDs and fluorescent lights can be dangerous. Mostly because we spend too much time indoors and indoor lighting was designed to save energy and money and not to optimize human health. Oops.
We absorb light information through our eyes and our skin. Our skin is our largest organ. What information are we giving ourselves when we’re constantly exposed to blue light? We’re telling our body that it’s constantly noon.
LED and CFL lights contain too much blue light that harms the eyes and stops production of key hormones in our body. This is because indoor lighting is lacking red and infrared. Our body is not designed to process blue light without red and infrared and had never encountered blue light after sunset in our past.
This recent Harvard study on the dark side of blue light helps explain the dangers of too much blue.
Artificial lighting also rarely contains any red, infrared or UV light. This is especially true now that we have begun the ban on incandescent lighting (sad emoji). Incandescent contained very little to no blue and contained red and infrared.
Change over to Incandescent and halogen lighting if possible and use firelight as much as you can at night.
HOW TO OVERCOME YOUR INDOOR EXISTENCE WITH PBM
Above is a photo from our most recent biohacking retreat. We keep these pretty secret, so if you want an invite, sign up for the PrimalHacker newsletter to be notified of the next one.
Finally, we know so much more about light and how healthy it is. Avoiding the sun is a bad idea. But sometimes you work all day indoors.
Red and infrared lights have been created to concentrate and supplement these critical sunlight frequencies that we miss out on by living indoors.
UVB bulbs can help us manufacture vitamin D sulfate in the winter in northern latitudes when we cant head South.
Full spectrum infrared saunas supplement mid and far infrared that we’re lacking in the winter and help us detox.
You can buy home devices to obtain the benefits of this light without heading out into the sun.
PBM devices are something you could use in the winter when you live in northern latitudes to make up for lack of sun.
You could also supplement with these lights to decrease wrinkles, reduce inflammation, increase collagen, heal wounds and maybe even regrow hair on a balding head!.
PBM DEFINITION
PBM is the use of light to affect biology.
According to Dr. Michael Hamblin, PBM is the absorption of red and near-infrared photons of light to provide a benefit. Red light in the 600-700nm wavelength and infrared in the 780-1200nm wavelength.
Dr. Michael Hamblin is one of the leading researchers studying Low-Level Light Therapy. Michael Hamblin is a Principal Investigator at the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, an Associate Professor of Dermatology at Harvard Medical School and a member of the Affiliated Faculty of Harvard-MIT Division of Health Science and Technology.
I think light therapy goes beyond just red and infrared light and that green, yellow and many other wavelengths of light will be proven to have biological effects. These include the Ultra-violet UVB and UVA as well as mid and far infrared.
Here’s an excerpt from his 2008 paper titled: MECHANISMS OF LOW LEVEL LIGHT THERAPY:
“The use of low levels of visible or near-infrared (NIR) light for reducing pain, inflammation and edema, promoting healing of wounds, deeper tissues and nerves, and preventing tissue damage has been known for almost forty years since the invention of lasers. Originally thought to be a peculiar property of laser light (soft or cold lasers), the subject has now broadened to include photobiomodulation and photobiostimulation using non-coherent light. Despite many reports of positive findings from experiments conducted in vitro, in animal models and in randomized controlled clinical trials, LLLT remains controversial. This likely is due to two main reasons; firstly, the biochemical mechanisms underlying the positive effects are incompletely understood, and secondly, the complexity of rationally choosing amongst a large number of illumination parameters such as wavelength, fluence, power density, pulse structure and treatment timing has led to the publication of a number of negative studies as well as many positive ones. In particular, a biphasic dose response has been frequently observed where low levels of light have a much better effect than higher levels.
This introductory review will cover some of the proposed cellular chromophores responsible for the effect of visible light on mammalian cells, including cytochrome c oxidase (with absorption peaks in the NIR), and photoactive porphyrins. Mitochondria are thought to be a likely site for the initial effects of light, leading to increased ATP production, modulation of reactive oxygen species, and induction of transcription factors. These effects in turn lead to increased cell proliferation and migration (particularly by fibroblasts), modulation in levels of cytokines, growth factors and inflammatory mediators, and increased tissue oxygenation. The results of these biochemical and cellular changes in animals and patients include such benefits as increased healing of chronic wounds, improvements in sports injuries and carpal tunnel syndrome, pain reduction in arthritis and neuropathies, and amelioration of damage after heart attacks, stroke, nerve injury, and retinal toxicity.”
This part of the paper is well worth paying attention to:
“In fact, light therapy is one of the oldest therapeutic methods used by humans (historically as solar therapy by Egyptians, later as UV therapy for which Nils Finsen won the Nobel prize in 1904 [2]). The use of lasers and LEDs as light sources was the next step in the technological development of light therapy, which is now applied to many thousands of people worldwide each day. In LLLT, the question is no longer whether light has biological effects, but rather how energy from therapeutic lasers and LEDs work at the cellular and organism levels, and what are the optimal light parameters for different uses of these light sources.”
WHAT TO FOCUS ON WHEN BUYING A RED LIGHT
When thinking about buying a red light device for PBM, pay attention to the certain critical issues:
- Does the light have benefits? In other words, do users of the light report benefiting from using the light. It would be a waste of money to buy a light that hasn’t been well tested and that has little to no positive feedback in terms of actual real-world results.
- Do you want to buy a laser or an LED light? They may or may not yield the same benefits.
- Wavelength used. Does the red light use a wavelength in the biologically active band?
- The intensity of the light. If you don’t know what the intensity of the light is, you will have no idea how long to use it or how far away it needs to be from your body.
- The non-native EMF from the light (electric and magnetic fields) and more. If the light is putting out high EMF, you might not be doing any good.
- LED flicker may negatively affect our biology, however, Dr. Hamblin thinks that pulsed LED and therefore potentially flicker may be beneficial for PBM.
- The amount of time a red light device is used makes a big difference. The effect is referred to as biphasic. This means that low levels of light can have a stimulating and beneficial effect while higher levels of light can have an inhibitory effect.
All these can have an impact on your results.
Based on our research and testimonials as well as multiple conversations with others, the two lights we recommend for PBM are:
Joovv - use discount code Primalhacker for $25 off
Here is our new Red Light Buyer's Guide
IMPORTANT LIGHT THERAPY FACTORS
2 Types of Light
Before we get too far down the PBM rabbit hole, we have to talk about coherence.
To simplify things a little, there are two basic types of light. Coherent light and incoherent light.
Coherent Light
Coherent light is laser light.
Most photobiomodulation studies performed in the past on how light affects human biology has been done with coherent light. This translates to lasers.
Coherent light is a beam of photons all having the same exact frequency and all in phase with each other. It is a single beam that will not spread of diffuse. Lasers were used because LEDs were virtually unknown in the 1960s, having just been invented in 1962.
The benefits of laser light to have a positive biological effect were first noticed in the 1960s when a doctor studied their effect in rats, hoping to show the negative effects of lasers. He found faster wound healing instead.
According to Dr. Hamblin’s paper
“One of the most topical and widely discussed issues in the LLLT clinical community is whether the coherence and monochromatic nature of laser radiation have additional benefits, as compared with more broad-band light from a conventional light source or LED with the same center wavelength and intensity. Two aspects of this problem must be distinguished: the coherence of light itself and the coherence of the interaction of light with matter (biomolecules, tissues). The latter interaction produces the phenomenon known as laser speckle, which has been postulated to play a role in the photobiomodulation interaction with cells and subcellular organelles. It is difficult to design an experiment to directly compare coherent laser light with non-coherent non-laser light for the following reason. Laser light is almost always monochromatic with a bandwidth of 1 nm or less, and it is very difficult to generate light from any other source (even an LED) that has a bandwidth narrower than 10-20 nm, therefore it will be uncertain if observed differences are due to coherent versus non-coherent light, or due to monochromatic versus narrow bandwidth light.”
So, there are some admitted differences between lasers and LEDs, but on the whole, experts believe that LEDs replicate the benefits seen with lasers.
Incoherent Light
Incoherent light, like the sun, LEDs, incandescent light bulbs and firelight have light that is not in phase with the other photons of light and it can diffuse. Only recently have scientists begun researching PBM with incoherent light sources.
The sun, being incoherent is the original photobiomodulation light. Recently, incoherent light like LEDs have been used because they are cheaper than lasers, do not require special training or safety equipment, and appear to have the same benefits as laser light at the same wavelengths.
“Most of the early work in this field was carried out with various kinds of lasers, and it was thought that laser light had some special characteristics not possessed by light from other light sources such as sunlight, fluorescent or incandescent lamps and now LEDs. However all the studies that have been done comparing lasers to equivalent light sources with similar wavelength and power density of their emission, have found essentially no difference between them.” (Hamblin 2017)
LEDs were able to be used for PBM beginning in 1998 based on a NASA invention that increased the intensity of LEDs by using photon interference. The amplitude of the photon wavelength could be increased when constructive interference occurred (waves in sync with each other). This led to many successful applications of LEDs in PBM.
Pay Attention
If you look into the literature about light therapy, pay attention to whether referenced studies refer to the use of laser light or LED light. Pay attention to the wavelength used, the time the light was used and the total power delivered to the skin.
Some articles suggest that it makes a difference, that coherent light may provide benefits that non-coherent light will not. If you want to do your research on the best type of light for the issue you want to fix, then ensure the studies were performed effectively with noncoherent, LED light. Here is a link to a number of studies showing laser light helped accelerate healing while LED did not.
However, Dr. Michael Hamblin from Harvard University and one of the foremost researchers on LLLT suggests that studies performed with both coherent and non-coherent light are essentially equivalent. A study performed with a laser showing a specific benefit should show the same benefit using an LED light.
In general, studies appear to support both types of light are effective, but laser light penetrates deeper for deep tissue healing better than LED. LED could still be used for those benefits, but would need an increased power output to reach deeper tissues based on the opinion of Dr. Hamblin.
Cool Vs Warm Light
When choosing light bulbs for your home, keep in mind that Cooler light has more white and blue wavelengths and warmer light has more red color of light. We want less blue light in our homes and more red light. Regardless, if it's a standard LED light off the shelf, whether it's warm or cool, it likely has too much white and blue light. Just get a red LED light for nighttime use that comes with a single wavelength of 630 or 660nm red light. That's what I use at home after dark whenever possible. And my kids love it, so there's that.
Personally, I have removed all the LED lights from my home (except those used for PBM) and put in incandescent lights with clear bulbs. These lights have virtually no blue light. I also try to have several red LED bulbs around of 660nm wavelength to light at night when I don’t need to see colors very well. If you light at night with red light, you will be unable to tell what colors things are, it gets all washed out.
I might pay a few more dollars each month for lighting cost, but it sure beats obesity, cancer and poor health associated with blue light from LEDs.
MECHANISM OF ACTION
Mitochondrial Energy Booster
Basically, red and infrared help our mighty mitochondria function better. Better functioning mitochondria mean more energy and less risk for disease.
Red Light and Near Infrared are the only wavelengths that penetrate through the skin. Blue light is scattered too quickly and can have negative effects when absorbed, especially at the wrong time of day and in chronic doses. Mid and far infrared are absorbed by water in the body and serve to heat up the water but do not act on our mitochondria directly.
Red and infrared light are absorbed by chromophores. Chromophores are just biological entities that absorb light. The most important chromophores that absorb light are water and cytochrome C oxidase (CCO).
CCO is the more important chromophore in PBM because it’s located in the electron transport chain of the mitochondria.
Light is absorbed by CCO and works by breaking the bond between nitric oxide and cytochrome c oxidase. When nitric oxide (NO) binds to CCO, ATP production is reduced. By absorbing light and freeing NO, ATP production is increased.
When this bond is broken oxygen can bind to NADH. This permits hydrogen ions to take their normal pathway and produce ATP (our main energy storage molecule/energy currency) synthase.
How is ATP produced? It is produced via cellular respiration, this process has four steps. First, glycolysis; Second, pyruvate oxidation; Third, Krebs cycle; Fourth and final step, oxidative phosphorylation. Most of these processes occur in Mitochondria!
Red and near-infrared light effect the final step of cellular respiration (oxidative phosphorylation). ATP is formed via an electron transport chain, electrons flow down the electron transport chain producing a release of energy allowing the cell to pump protons out of the matrix, and this process forms a gradient. ATP is made when protons cross over the gradient back into the matrix.
This process also involves cytochrome c oxidase helping oxygen bind with NADH. When oxygen ions bind with NADH they form the essential ions that produce ATP.
Red and near-infrared light enhance this process and restore the production of ATP, it allows the cells to have a normal metabolism again.
Throughout daily life, we damage our cells, so when their metabolism is returned to normal there will be numerous benefits to our bodies.
In “Normal” cells, the NO can create Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) in the cell. While in cells that already contain ROS, the release of the NO reduces ROS and therefore inflammation of the cell.
“The increase in ATP production and ROS creating leads to other changes in cell function, such as gene expression and growth factor production (Prindeze et al. 2012).”
“It is suggested that when energy metabolism is subpar chronic diseases can result and therefore red light, by increasing mitochondrial function may help alleviate disease..”
Collagen Synthesis
Collagen production can also be improved through the release of anti-inflammatory cytokines, therefore, stimulating fibroblasts.
According to Dr. Hamblin, TGF-ß is a growth factor responsible for inducing collagen synthesis from fibroblasts and has been reported to be upregulated by LLLT [68].
PBM stimulates fibroblasts and wound healing cells that increase collagen synthesis, reduce photo-aging and help improve skin.
Think about how resilient children’s bodies are, they recover quickly from injuries, this is because their cells have a normal cellular metabolism. At any age restoring your cells metabolism will produce many benefits.
PBM BENEFITS
Healthier Skin and Reduced Wrinkles
Who doesn't want to hack aging. Less wrinkles? Yes please!
81% of subjects reported a significant improvement in per orbital wrinkles (wrinkles around the eyes) on completion of follow‐up [r] [r].
That’s right, anyone over the age of 35 should be using a red light.
Regrow Hair
That’s right guys, try putting a red light on those bald patches. Hey, it’s worth a shot! Not only is it cheaper than drugs, but it’s largely without side effects. This study lists three effective research trials showing regrowth of hair with red and infrared light!
Heal Injuries
I am not making a claim that this will heal your injury, but here’s what the research shows….
Low-level light therapy (LLLT) also known as photobiomodulation (PBM) therapy has been practiced for close to 5 decades. There are many hundreds of clinical trials published.
LLLT has still not been widely accepted or practiced by Western medicine. And yet, it works! It works quickly, is healthy, and has no side effects.
Lack of understanding and access to a light therapy device is often the biggest issue.
Near-infrared penetrates the tissue better than red light, so it’s more commonly used for treating body parts that are under the skin (brain, glands, joints, muscles). Visible red light is more commonly used in the treatment of wounds or skin diseases.
There has been a large number of research studies recently conducted that has demonstrated how PBM can heal injuries and wounds. Research conducted on mice, burn injuries and even navy seals have shown how PBM can heal injuries or wounds.
The way PBM heals injuries is by stimulating the photoreceptors in mitochondrial respiratory chains. Therefore, insinuating that PBM accelerates electron transfers in the respiratory chain, making more ATP readily available.
Numerous scientific studies are being published on the effects of photobiomodulation. There has been evidence for light therapy in aiding the body in tissue repair and wound healing [r].
Also, PBM causes a decrease in reactive oxygen species, which prevents tissue destruction and facilitates wound healing. PBM heals wounds because wounds/injuries because essentially all wounds and injuries don’t heal due to mitochondrial dysfunction and the research has shown how PBM facilitates mitochondria, dysfunctional mitochondria, to restore their normal metabolism. When the mitochondria have their metabolism restored this leads to wound healing because of mitochondria’s role in regulating reactive oxygen species inside of the cell.
Here are a whole bunch of studies to support faster healing using PBM:
http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/104454701753342758
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1524-4725.2007.34065.x/full
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S156772490400145X
https://www.google.com/patents/US5766233
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1196/annals.1352.040/full
Athletic Performance and Recovery
Infrared light can reduce the time it takes athletes to recover, specifically 830 nm near-infrared light was tested. (r)
Specifically, red and infrared light has been shown to speed up athletic performance and recovery by enhancing the athletes sleep quality.
In 2012 there was a research study on a women’s Chinese basketball team. Every night the treatment group was exposed to 30 minutes of whole body red light therapy for 14 days in a row. After 14 nights of the treatment, the athletes completed a sleep quality questionnaire, had their serum melatonin assessed and had a 12-minute run which times were compared pre-intervention and post-intervention. The results showed that the treatment group had improved sleep, melatonin levels and 12 minute run performance.
This study demonstrated how red light therapy could be effective in helping athletes sleep after training sessions and decrease the risk for sleep disorders that commonly occur after training. Sleep is an essential part of recovery that is when the body repairs all the damaged tissues caused by training, with better sleep the athlete’s bodies were able to recover more efficiently for training the following day, therefore, increasing their athletic performance.
Humans perform better when they are connected with their circadian rhythm. For athletes traveling across the country or the world to compete this can be concerning, due to jet lag.
Jet lag is essentially the resynchronization of a person’s circadian rhythm until the individual is adapted to the new environment. This research study used phototherapy to hack jet lag. They exposed the participants to either bright white or dim red light for 2-3 hours in the am, this showed to be effective in aiding individuals to have a nights sleep without waking.
Also when participants were flown from Tokyo to San Francisco an 8-hour time difference the researchers had them expose themselves to bright light for 3 hours in the morning of their new time zone. Exposing them to bright light in the morning allowed the individual to accelerate their ability to synchronize with the circadian rhythm in the new environment.
This could be a great hack for athletes especially those who travel. In order for peak athletic performance, it is important to have a good night sleep. Therefore exposing yourself to red or infrared light in the morning can help your melatonin production occur (we now know this occurs in the AM through the retina) and therefore help your body sleep at the appropriate time for the new environment.
If you can’t do the FREE practice of getting outside in the morning around sunrise (Red and infrared light only at sunrise), then think about supplementing with a red light device.
Weight Loss
“As UV light levels decline in fall, and carbohydrates remain available during these times mammals normally fatten because of the speeds of the SCN are slowed while the ECT in the gut’s organs is made faster. This readies the animal for winter. Carbohydrates do not make you fat, but the lack of UV light delivered to your eye does.” [r]
Obesity begins in the eye according to Dr. Jack Kruse. When we do not get the energy we need from light we turn to food. Due to the increase of blue light and the decrease of UV light our bodies are not absorbing enough light to create the energy we need. Therefore we unconsciously turn to food in order to obtain more energy (or vitamin D3). If we were getting adequate sunlight we would not need as much food.
Skin Health and Anti-Aging
“Although the skin is the organ that is naturally exposed to light more than any other organ, it still responds well to red and near-infrared wavelengths. The photons are absorbed by mitochondrial chromophores in skin cells. Consequently, electron transport, adenosine triphosphate (ATP) nitric oxide release, blood flow, reactive oxygen species increase and diverse signaling pathways get activated. Stem cells can be activated allowing increased tissue repair and healing. In dermatology, LLLT has beneficial effects on wrinkles, acne scars, hypertrophic scars, and healing of burns.” [r]
Joint Pain and Arthritis
Photobiomodulation therapy associated with treadmill training in the oxidative stress in a collagen-induced arthritis model. Physical exercise associated with PBMT decreases lipid peroxidation and increases antioxidant activity. This study shows how PBM can be an effective antioxidant and decrease oxidative stress, which can reduce the symptoms of joint pain and arthritis. Also, the fact that PBM is anti-inflammatory, would also decrease inflammation. Inflammation is sometimes the key player in joint pain and arthritis, PBM would help reduce this and therefore reduce pain and stiffness associated with joint pain and arthritis [r].
Increasing Testosterone
Light therapy, namely PBM may be able to increase testosterone. While you don’t want to shine a high heat producing light on your balls, for obvious reasons, PBM using the right wavelengths might help to increase testosterone.
This is likely only possible if yours is lower than normal, but even if not, worth a shot.
There are a few studies showing an increase in testosterone with PBM, namely the mechanism is thought to be an increase in ATP of the cells that produce testosterone due to the red light. I’d say the jury isn’t out yet on this one, but it certainly does not appear to hurt and just may jack your low testosterone back up.[r, r, r, r, r, r] Anecdotally, this is how Ben Greenfield uses his Joovv PBM device. I’m pretty sure anytime he can take off his shirt and/or be naked, he’s in.
You can also exercise, get cold, sleep more, relax, and massively reduce your carbs and increase fat to boost testosterone.
Increased Energy
Photobiomodulation increases mitochondrial energy production by red or near infrared while blue and green light decreased mitochondrial function [r].
Periodontal Disease
In a scientific study rats with periodontal disease, a gum infection that destroys the jawbone, low-level laser therapy was an effective treatment in order to protect the rat from tissue damage and reduced the bone loss from this infection [r].
Pain and Inflammation
Light has been shown to reduce pain when the light is being targeted in a certain area.
Also light can help reduce inflammation, which is the leading cause of most illnesses.
Scientific studies have demonstrated that PBM, when used on cells that have been stressed or diseased, it lowers reactive oxygen species (ROS) [r]. These findings are very encouraging for the medical profession, for the treatment of many chronic illnesses such as cancer. An increased production of ROS has been attributed to activating oncogenes and/or inactivating tumor suppressor genes, which cause mitochondrial dysfunction and a decrease in antioxidant production [r].
Anti-Aging
PBM can be an effective anti-aging strategy, research done on transcranial low-level laser therapy (LLLT) has shown improvement in cognitive decline from aging, mitochondrial function, and apoptosis [r].
Apoptosis is one of the most effective anti-aging strategies. We want the weak cells to die off in order for new stronger cells to develop. Also, many forms of cancer are caused due to lack of apoptosis. The medical community, from Dr. Terry Wahls or Dr. Kruse has been preaching that 98% of chronic diseases are caused form mitochondrial deficiencies with the environmental toxins, who wouldn’t want to upgrade their mitochondria’s performance.
Structured Water
PBM can also be used to structure your water.
NEXT, SUPPLEMENT WITH UVB
UVB is totally missing indoors. Even if you work in a naturally lit room, the glass filters out the UVB and allows in the UVA. UVB is what creates vitamin D in the skin.
If you live in a northern climate, the sun never makes it high enough in the winter to produce enough UVB for you to manufacture vitamin D.
Many people supplement during these times with vitamin D pills. Based on new research, this may be a bad idea.
Instead, Chris and Thaddeus each invested in a UVB tanning bulb lamp, called Sperti, to get UVB in the winter when the sun is at too low of an angle to produce UVB.
Be careful to limit your exposure and wear special glasses to protect your eyes. This concentrated light can be damaging if you stare at it, so use the tanning goggles that people wear to the tanning booths.
UVA SUPPLEMENTATION
You can buy a blacklight or a blacklight flashlight. Most people who use these, use them at night in combination with an incandescent light.
Since we used to always experience either firelight or sunlight with UVA, we should either light at night with candles or a combination of incandescent and UVA light. At least, that’s what Dr. Jack Kruse does and recommends. Is this a bad idea?? Frankly, we haven’t investigated the mechanism well enough yet. We’ll offer updates as we learn more about UVA supplementation using blacklights. For now, use at your own risk.
INFRARED
We're talking about mid and far infrared here. These are typically found in infrared saunas and aren't considered by most experts to be true photobiomodulation. I disagree, because all wavelengths ultimately come from the sun and are therefore light. Saunas just use different mechanisms to create a benefit using light than do visible parts of the light spectrum. Saunas use light to vibrate water.
Mid and far infrared act on the water in the body and heat it up. Heating of this water helps the body detox, stimulates heat shock proteins, which in themselves have tons of benefits, and reduces inflammation, can lower blood pressure and more.
CONCLUSION
Red light therapy, UVB and infrared, all considered PBM are massive game changers for hacking our indoor lifestyle. While we at PrimalHacker always advocate for getting outside and getting natural sunlight, this isn’t always possible.
When you can’t get outside, when it’s fall, Spring, and Winter, or the rainy season, supplement with the right wavelengths of light for optimal health.