How Red Light Impacts Your Health
And, how to use it to your benefit.
Background
Before we dive into the uses and benefits, there are a couple of foundational stones we need to set in place, because what you are about to read may sound miraculous bordering on impossible.
First, we need to dispense with the industrial idea that lights only purpose is to illuminate. This fallacy is perfectly captured in the market push towards LED white light of everything, and disparagement of older technology such as incandescent bulbs as wasteful or inefficient.
This framing of LED bulbs being more “efficient” assumes that lights only purpose is to illuminate, thus justifying the industries refinement of light into something that uses the minimum energy necessary to illuminate the area in which it is used.
This framing is not only false, but unhealthy.
Light is a mode of communication, and like all modes of communication can be used to convey actions and effects.
For instance, if you have ever been to a clinic or hospital, you may have had this pulse oximeter placed on your finger. This device utilizes light to determine how much oxygen is circulating in your blood. (We won’t get into the technical details.)
Everything in our body has a color, including our skin and everything deeper. This may seem trivial to you. But, a question to ponder is…if outside light doesn’t get in, why does it have a color?
Why is your blood bright red or purple? Why is your heart red? Why are nerves white(ish)? Why is the liver blueish purple?
At the most basic level, our tissue is full of proteins which communicate wavelengths of light - these are called chromophores.
Use of light to communicate with and effect biologic change is the whole basis of a relatively new field of study called Optogenetics, pioneered by Karl Deisseroth. In this field, scientists attach light-sensitive proteins (ie chromophores) to pathways they want to effect, and can thus control the biology and behavior of experimental animals with pulses of lights.
The Problem
Since the post-industrial society has moved indoors for almost all operations, and for continued run-time of these operations during the dark hours of the day…there has been an increasing need to illuminate the work-life environment.
This need has been met with increasingly cost-effective and energy-efficient methods of illumination. This is not just LED, but it happens to be the largest player in the field. We now have increasingly overpowered and highly illuminating blue-white LED bulbs everywhere we go. The number of times I’ve been blinded by the latest LED headlights on cars…don’t get me started.
Over the last 50+ years, humans have experienced a drastic shift in the spectrum of light that their eyes, skin, and bodies have been exposed to.
This is the full spectrum of light from the Sun which reaches the earth. Visible light is more or less even in its intensity, but it is only a fraction of the way in which our bodies communicate with the celestial world.
Since our move towards an LED-lit world, the light fingerprint we are predominantly exposed to has shifted drastically. This is only a comparison of light-bulb technology to the visible light band of the solar spectrum.
To add insult to injury, our LED technologies vastly overrepresent the blue-green end of the spectrum (which is normally present from the sun at mid-day) during the darker hours of the day.
You can think of this change as scrambling the way in which our body’s machinery communicates. Scrambling of the messages the body uses to optimize its function invariably leads to disease.
The Solution
If you’ve been reading this publication for some time, you’d know that I have long been a proponent of moving as far away from refined stimuli as you can get.
One of the refined stimuli that bathe our environment is blue/white light. And so, minimizing time of exposure to this artificial light (especially when the Sun is down) is a key tenant of the long-term solution I propose for people who want to set a foundation for health, instead of playing whac-a-mole with each problem that a doctor brings to their attention.
Now, take a look back at the visible light spectrum of solar light.
Notice how well balanced the different colors of light are. This is a critical. You see, the two ends of the light spectrum often times have complementary physiologic effects. As even the late great Avicenna was aware of 1000 years ago, red-light can promote the flow of blood…whereas the blue/cool light tends to constrict blood.
Today, we know some of the mediators of these effects, and they include proteins & channels in the mitochondria as well as the production of smaller compounds like nitric oxide which mediate the effects that Avicenna observed so long ago.
So, for optimal cellular function you need a balanced exposure across the spectrum.
What does that mean for a modern human living in a heavily blue-lit environment?
We need to balance that exposure with more red-light exposure.
This has led to the rise of photobiomodulation (PBM) as a field of clinical and experimental study. You can read a very thorough and detailed analysis of the mechanisms and thousands of experiments which have studied the effects of PBM.
I spoke with a dermatologist recently who seemed to only be aware of the aesthetic and skin-benefits of red-light therapy. To his credit, this is more than what most doctors know. And, it’s true.
Personally, I have used red-light and sunlight in an attempt to promote hair growth on a large area of baldness that appeared on my face after the birth of our first child around the time I got fired for refusing the covid injection. It was a slow process, but what was baby-smooth skin on a quarter of my face, is now almost imperceptible.
It’s not just hair growth, but also skin quality and vitality which is affected by red light. In many studies, people have experimented with combining red light with green tea. Specifically with the use of 670nm light and cotton pads soaked in green tea.
It’s Not Just Skin Deep
As the comment from the dermatologist suggests, the few aware mainstream doctors have only a skin-deep appreciation for the benefits of light therapy or PBM. But, as you can see, different wavelengths of light have varying penetration. With this comes the ability of activating and effecting different parts of our biochemistry.
Above 600 nm light, we start to see interaction with things like lymphatics, blood vessels, and different classes of nerve endings. Each of which impart a different effect.
The Lesser Known Benefits
Without getting to wordy, let’s take a brief look at the variety of effects we can find with red-light therapy.
The most low-hanging fruit is the use of red-light to improve mitochondrial function to the extent that you can optimally regulate blood sugar, prevent insulin resistance and reverse or prevent diabetes.
Related to this finding, is the discovery that not only does it effect energy production at the mitochondrial level, but the impact extends to cardiovascular function. For instance, we now know that PBM impacts the tone of your blood vessels such that red-light leads to vasodilation and increased blood flow in the region where the light is detected. Just like Avicenna told us 1000 years ago.
More importantly, this has several downstream effects. For starters, blood vessel tone is directly related to blood pressure. Which means that PBM/Red-light reduces blood pressure (at least locally where the light hits the skin). At a local level, this improves circulation, speeds up recovery and reduces pain (such as when used to relieve joint pain).
At higher body exposure (like when you go outside or use a larger red-light panel), this will reduce systemic blood pressure. Which means you can treat hypertension with light.
Even more importantly, we know that stress on the lining of our blood vessels is directly related to the viscosity of blood (impacted by Nitric Oxide and Red-light) and the caliber of blood vessels (also impacted by light) which can promote turbulent blood flow. Ultimately, this results in damage to the blood vessel which then has to be patched up - we call this atherosclerosis. Atherosclerosis is the leading cause of heart disease, strokes, and organ dysfunction. And so, it is no stretch to suggest that Red/Infrared Light has a direct effect on endothelial (vessel lining) dysfunction.
Shifting gears, we can also see that PBM has tremendous application in the world of immunological diseases. Not surprising, as some of the mechanisms by which PBM impacts joint pain, rheumatologic disease, and atherosclerosis is also related to regulation of immune function.
Even in cases of “autoimmune” disease. For example, here we have a pilot study in which people with chronic autoimmune thyroiditis (low thyroid function) were treated with infrared light (830 nm) twice a week, for a total of 10 times. These patients were previously taking levothyroxine. Their findings?
All participants had lower need for levothyroxine
47% did not need any levothyroxine for 9 months after the treatment
Auto-antibodies for thyroid peroxidase were reduced
Circling Back
Last month, I announced that I would be doing a self-experiment in my household with the use of red-light to relieve gastric distress and heartburn if and when it arose. Now, I don't have recurring gastric issues ever since making drastic changes to my lifestyle. But, sometimes you have an off-day…and it comes up for whatever reason.
I hypothesized that since red-light has direct impact on melatonin production, and melatonin is known to improve gastric function (and even reverse gastric ulcers)…that shining red-light for 15-20 minutes around the navel would subdue symptoms.
Most recently, my wife has had success with this protocol.
After announcing this, I got dozens of e-mails from you (the readers) conveying interest to perform this on themselves. So, I obtained a discount from the manufacturer of the red-light panel that my family uses.
Very soon, I will be sharing the protocol that we use and how to safely and optimally use these red-light panels.
If you want to conduct this self-experiment, shoot me an e-mail at refluxrmd@pm.me
On the other hand, if you don’t want to do the self-experiment for the above purpose, but still want to experiment with the many and varied benefits of red-light therapy, feel free to use the discount link:
There are many other panels out there, and I get asked why I chose these in particular.
First, if you just want surface-level red light you can pick from any number of panels or just simple light bulbs that are out there.
But, I had specific requirements for my panel:
Portable, which means plug-in and use. Can’t do that with a floating light-bulb or a bulky device.
Specific and good range of wavelengths:
Ability to target deep and specific tissue/organs.
For example, if I want to target the stomach/esophagus for heartburn symptoms, I need a panel I can put right on my skin without heat injury, so that the light may permeate deeper to these structures.
Low flicker
Reasonably priced. Some of these panels are selling for stupid high prices given the technology that is inside them.
So much so that, a major player in this space (Chroma) has announced they will be slashing their prices incrementally but in very high proportions.
For those reasons, I went with GembaRed. They also have great documentation and blogs on red-light devices and how they compare to their competition.
Visit GembaRed and use discount code remnantmd at checkout.
I can see there will be lots of questions regarding specifics, so please leave them below and I will address them in a follow-up article. Had to leave out a lot of technical details for the sake of length of this first article.
Fascinating about the green tea! I wonder - if this is due to the green absorbing red, just like a plant?
FYI in 2028 sales of light bulbs performing at less than 125 L/W will also be banned. As Americans struggle to find healthy light bulbs, a few alternatives still exist, such as “zero blue” LED violet bulbs, red light bulbs to protect melatonin, as well as broad spectrum circadian LED bulbs that mimic natural daylight. Most of these bulbs currently operate under 125 L/W, and would also be banned as 2028 approaches:
https://romanshapoval.substack.com/p/orange