Why Sunlight Is Important For Your Health
How to biohack sunlight to improve your health.
Welcome to the light series.
Light is a widely underestimated factor for our health. As we now know, light has just as much influence on our bodies and our health as diet, sleep, or exercise. In this article, I will explain the basics you need to know about light in order to be able to use it specifically for yourself.
First of all: what actually is light?
From a biophysical point of view, light is a form of electromagnetic radiation. Every single ray of light on earth comes from the sun. What we humans know as "light" is mostly the visible range of light rays. The rest is called "radiation".
As you can see in the illustration below, light is made up of photons, which can appear in different wavelengths and frequencies, a spectrum or rainbow of energy.
Sunlight is the driving force behind all processes on Earth. Every energy transfer is due to solar radiation, which has not changed significantly in the last 4 billion years in our universe. Sunlight is a mixture of rays that is beneficial for the life process in every aspect.
According to quantum physics, electromagnetic radiation can be either a wave or a particle. The radiation spectrum of the sun ranges from X-rays with a length of 0.1 nanometres to radio waves with a length of several kilometres. Natural light is full spectrum, meaning it contains all colours (and some which you can not see) and it is dynamic, meaning that the intensity and colour temperature adjusts to the time of the day which depends where you are on Earth, your altitude and even your unique biochemistry (personalised nutrition) with how the light affects you.
To understand it better, just think of a rainbow.
It shows that sunlight consists of seven colours, which are violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange and red. The colours become visible when they are broken down by raindrops. However, natural light also contains wavelengths that we cannot see. Visible light ranges from violet 400 nm to red 700 nm. Collectively, they are called "optical radiation".
Most people often associate the word "light" only with visible light (during the day) or the light that comes from light bulbs.
But non-visible light is also crucial for our health, for example ultraviolet (<400nm) drives vitamin D and melanin production and infrared light makes our skin glow. For us humans, the UV, the visible and the infrared light are all of particular importance.
Without light we wouldn’t exist.
Without light there would be no life, neither plants, animals nor humans. That is a fact and actually self-evident.
We humans live according to the circadian rhythm, the day and night rhythm, which lasts about 24 hours and is of great importance. Our cells “collect" light and capture light quanta.
We have radiation receivers, for example photoreceptors and even water (hydrogen). Photoreceptors in particular, are not only located in the eye but also in other cells of the body such as the endothelial lining and on our skin. Two of these light-sensitive molecules are melanopsin and neuropsin, which set our internal clock. Another structure in the human body that can receive and utilise light are the so-called chromophores. The best known is melanin, which colours our skin and protects it from too much uv radiation. It can even use the energy of the sun's rays and convert it into energy for our cells and store it by splitting water to create energy transfer to the cell with redox carriers. This is also the reason why we glow at night: the energy stored in melanin is then released as free heat.
Without the electrical excitation by light quanta, there would be no biochemical reaction.
How our light exposure is supposed to be like
The natural light spectrum changes throughout the day. In the early morning, when the sun is not yet above the horizon, the blue light component is low and the sunlight appears reddish. The blue light is needed to wake us up and release cortisol. At midday, the light appears whiter and colder and the blue component reaches its peak. In the early evening, the blue light disappears completely and the red component increases. This is due to the wavelengths and the ionosphere reflecting the wave lengths with the red penetrating through with its longer wavelengths The communication between mitochondria, other organelles and the cell nucleus is directly regulated by light signals. For our circadian rhythm, we need exactly this sequence of light spectra.
Why are we “light deficient” in a world full of light?
Light is omnipresent nowadays - our natural day and night cycle (circadian rhythm) is no longer existent. In addition, we have been told for decades that the sun is harmful for us and that we should completely protect our bodies from it (if the sun would be that bad and damaging, how could our ancestors evolve with it the last 3,5 million years? But that’s another topic..).
But not only the lighting conditions have changed - the darkness has too.
Most of us live under too little natural light during the day and under too much artificial light at night. How can we think that this has no effect on our health?
For our ancestors, after sunset there was only moonlight, the light of the stars or light from the fire. Today, we have all kinds of light sources after sunset, such as television, smartphones, etc. There is hardly any absolute darkness any more, neither in cities nor in villages in the countryside. 99% of all western society is now artificially lit at night which is shown from space stations. For an optimal environment, however, not only air quality, pure water and nutrient-rich soil are important, but also natural light and dark cycles.
The problem is: the one-sided use of artificial light sources has direct physiological effects. Too much artificial blue light at the wrong time of day promotes cortisol production in the brain, steals electrons, reduces our redox potential, uncouples our circadian rhythm and impacts our immune system, microbiome, liver and nervous system etc. . The more you disconnect yourself from the natural light cycle, the more messed up your biochemical pathways will be.
Now ask yourself, if you’re under artificial light all day, the only time your face sees the sun is the 5 minutes you went to a shop ( and then it's probably covered in sunscreen, sunglasses windows, a hat, and make up) whereas the rest of your body is covered in clothes, and in addition you're bombarding your body with blue light from TV, light bulbs till you fall asleep. What does that do to the way you make energy cellular respiration, make water as a by-product and overall health?
Think of a plant that would stand in a completely dark room but you would water and fertilise it. It wouldn’t thrive and would die after a few days. We humans are exactly like that. We need light to live, it is just as essential as nutrients. But unlike plants, we are not able to convert sunlight into chemical energy, so we are dependent on the consumption of plants or plant-eating animals to absorb the light information.
“Early to bed, early to rise, makes people healthy, wealthy and wise.” - Benjamin Franklin
There are several ways to assist circadian rhythms despite our unnatural lighting conditions. here are three:
1. Go outside early in the morning when you get up and watch the sunrise. Don't look at your mobile phone beforehand, we always need blue light in combination with red light and that is only given under natural light. The blue light in the morning stops the production of the sleep hormone melatonin and promotes cortisol and adrenaline production. This is important, it makes us awake and agile, improves cognition and alertness . In addition, natural light in the morning supports the synchronisation of our chronobiological rhythms via the eyes and sets the neurotransmitters for the day. So please don't get the idea of going out with sunglasses on (By the way, this doesn't just apply to the morning, but at any time of day).
2. If you spend a lot of time indoors and in front of screens, you should go out regularly and take breaks or at least open the window. It isn’t enough to work in front of a window, because they filter out about forty percent of the red light, which is why it is predominantly blue indoors.
Take breaks and go outside and expose your skin as much as possible. As mentioned above, not only the eyes have photoreceptors but also your skin has.
Stop watching Netflix and watch the sunset. It's not just beautiful to watch with friends or for a romantic evening with your partner. The sunset supports melatonin production and helps to wind down. Avoid blue lights after sunset.
Use candles (ideally beeswax)
Blue light blocking glasses (especially when exposed to artificial light) 15% off using discount code LIVEVITAE15 Link
IRIS on your desktop to reduce brightness and flicker effect. Link
Use a red light therapy device to add back in the infrared and red light that an indoor environment blocks. Link (Use code LIVEVITAE20)
or just go to sleep.
Disclaimer:
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