[cowsaymoo]

A family member of mine is involved in research into using red/NIR light to improve brain injuries outcomes. Apparently it can also irradiate passing blood which then circulates with the same mitochondrial clean up signals, so it has some secondary effects on non-penetrated areas.

I got to try a prototype LED helmet that blasts 90 watts of lensed, circumspaced NIR beams through the skull for 4 minutes. I can say that an hour later it leaves me feeling mildly buzzed. The main effect I can identify is a mild and general sense of stamina/energy. I used it before/after an all-nighter and didn't feel as impacted as I should have; analogous to how you feel the next morning after drinking at age 20 vs. age 30. All anecdotal of course.

They took the helmet away to give to a kid with an recent brain injury, but swapped it with a hefty 2-foot, 1800W panel. It comes with tanning goggles and instructions saying to be nude and 12 inches away from it for 20 minutes per day--so a bit quacky. But it's apparently big in professional sports clinics for speeding tissue and joint healing.

[bethekind]

I have so many questions about both apparatuses. 90W input or irradiated? Pulse width modulated/dimmed? Lasers? LEDs? 850nm? 830nm? 810nm?

For the panel, 1800W is a LOT of power to put through 2 feet. Is it actually 1800W? What wavelengths? PWM?

I've been using a NIR belt flipped inside out on my pillow the last few weeks. It's only 6W of 850nm, but I've been feeling less dumb recently. Not sure if it's correlated, but until I settle it for sure, I'm going to keep on using it.

[cowsaymoo]

The prototype came with a power supply that is set at 24V, 5A and consumes 90W when running. Not sure how the control circuits work but its pretty simply operated with a 3P2T switch for 650nm/Off/850nm. Each module contains a fan cooled array of LEDs behind a plastic lens. I think it has some thermal shut off protection circuit as well.

I just dug out the spec sheet for the other device and you're right. It says "LED Power Class 1800W", but lists power consumption as 350W.

I really like it's potential to improve the right kind of symptoms when applied correctly and I'm also wary of people with bottom line incentives filling in any scientific uncertainty with miracle cures. But I agree, it's definitely worth using. It's a one time purchase with no side effects, so the worst case risk is just disappointment.

[throwway120385]

It would probably be 1800W continuously but is pulsed and the duty cycle probably limits the power to 350W.

[b112]

Can light penetrate the skull bones though?

[lukeinator42]

yes, and you can even use infrared spectroscopy to infer brain activity via the bold signal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_near-infrared_spect...

[ankitml]

infrared, yes. Although depends on skin colour wrapping the skull. Melanin absorbs everything under the sun. It has very high absorption of UV but somewhat absorbs infrared too in this range of frequencies. Darker the color of skin, higher the melanin and higher the absorption by skin.

[energy123]

Yes

[CyberDildonics]

Light is anything in the spectrum visible to people, with the exception of infrared being called light. What evidence do you have that this is true?

[kjs3]

Not wanting to violate the "don't tell people to google the obvious, no matter how condescending they're being", I googled the obvious for you.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10103-024-04024-z

To achieve a neuroprotective effect, PBM must overcome several barriers, including bone tissue, a complex structure with variable optical properties

https://www.spiedigitallibrary.org/journals/neurophotonics/v...

Photobiomodulation (PBM) is a near-infrared (NIR) light-based therapy technique and has shown therapeutic effectiveness for various neuropsychiatric disorders, including MDD. The transcranial PBM (t-PBM) technique delivers NIR light through the scalp and skull.

https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neuroscience/articles/1...

Near-infrared spectroscopy in the brain is made possible by the relative transparency of biological tissues (including bone) to light for infrared wavelengths ranging from 650 to 925 nm.

[Filligree]

Radio waves do with no trouble. Blue does not at all. Everything between is on a sliding scale; there are no qualitative changes until you get to ionising radiation.

Though there’s a bit in the middle where it matches the resonant frequency of water molecules, yes.

[toomuchtodo]

> They took the helmet away to give to a kid with an recent brain injury, but swapped it with a hefty 2-foot, 1800W panel. It comes with tanning goggles and instructions saying to be nude and 12 inches away from it for 20 minutes per day--so a bit quacky. But it's apparently big in professional sports clinics for speeding tissue and joint healing.

I think the commercial model here is a tanning bed config with LED tubes. Goggles on, hop in the healing tube.

[energy123]

What is the distance of the LED from the scalp? I want to approximate the amount of irradiance (mW/squared area).

[cowsaymoo]

It sits right on the head with a ~1 inch foam spacer. The lens might change the fluence, which I think was a key part of the pending patent. Also 90W is the power draw for all the modules in the helmet. I can ask though what the targeted mW/area is and reply if I can get an answer.

[astroid]

I have a TBI which resulted in a number of chronic symptoms including decades of memory loss, although thankfully I retained my functional intelligence at least so I can keep working (although I still have many ongoing issues including atypical migraines leading to cyclic vomiting etc).

I have been exploring red light therapy using cheapo panels as well as fischer wallace devices (and have the OAK preordered via the IPO stock options), so I'm definitely trying out all the 'technologic approaches' since traditional medicine has been largely of no use (shout out to ondandestrone though, the best nausea suppresant I know of which can help fend off the migraince/vomiting episodes).

All that to say: Is your friend interested in any more TBI test subjects? Happy to pay for the device assuming I can afford it and provide detailed notes to help with any studies; this sounds like exactly the type of thing I need to try next.

No worries if not, but figured it couldn't hurt to ask.

[energy123]

> I can ask though what the targeted mW/area is and reply if I can get an answer.

Please do.

[ankitml]

whats the pulse frequency you use?

[prododev]

I mean, it is kinda quacky to treat someone with that until it's demonstrated by science. I'm open to the idea that light is an important regulator, but that effect should be easily observable if it's truly effective.

[cowsaymoo]

I'm no expert but my gist is that light interacts with an enzyme in the electron transport chain (cytochrome c oxidase). CCO is embedded in the inner membrane of mitochondria, and nitric oxide binds to CCO which temporarily inhibits cellular respiration as a natural metabolic regulation to control oxidative stress. Red and NIR light can photodissociate NO from CCO with the right intensity and wavelength, which restarts cellular respiration and ATP production. The release of NO into the bloodstream can secondarily trigger other chemical pathways involved in vasodilation and reactive oxygen species management.

Edit: found a wiki with more details:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light-emitting_diode_therapy#P...

[BobaFloutist]

In general, with a very few exceptions, if the body has a regulatory mechanism there's at least some reason for it, and tinkering with it without understanding it can have unpredictable downsides.

>as a natural metabolic regulation to control oxidative stress

That sounds like something I'd be very wary of manipulating without a good deal of clinical trials. Isn't oxidative stress one of like three primary hypothesized mechanisms of aging?

[nine_k]

The body has regulatory mechanisms formed 100k to 1000k years ago, and some even older. The life was a bit different then, as was humans' mental capacity and knowledge.

This is why humans have to actively overcome and sometimes subvert various mechanisms that presume the need to conserve the energy: they hit a gym which the body doesn't like, they limit sugars and fats which the body craves, they consume caffeine, nicotine, or even cocaine to trick the body into working harder and complaining less.

Compared to that, hitting the body with some NIR radiation seems very benign. You can get a lot of that just by walking in the sun, and there are no known adverse effects of that, unlike, say the use of the chemical substances. If anything, it's a promising field of research.

[BobaFloutist]

>You can get a lot of that just by walking in the sun, and there are no known adverse effects of that

Other than sunburn and skin cancer?

[ankitml]

Morning and evening is entirely infrared (80-90 percent with rest of it visible). No UV.

[nine_k]

Sunburns and skin cancer are induced by UV, not NIR light. Put on the protective cream.

[Etheryte]

The topmost comment in this comment thread starts with the fact that there are over a thousand studies on this already, no? Even if the whole effect isn't well understood, it seems like there is some science behind this.

[0xEF]

One could argue that the research goes all the way back to Dr Frederick Cook aboard the Belgica during an Antarctic expedition I which they became trapped by the sea ice. The men suffered from multiple maladies, scurvy included, with one of the prescribed treatments being to stand nude near a blazing fire for an hour. If his notes are to be believed, the men saw some immediate changed in their overall health beyond simply getting warm. By some accounts, he became a bit of a fanatic about how much we humans need the sun, after that.

[Angostura]

Or it could be vitamin D, or sunlight killing ticks, or fungal pathogens, or it could be the release of endorphins due to mild sun burn, or any number of other things.

[0xEF]

I'd say it's all those things, likely in different combinations based on the circumstances. Cook's notes indicate that he may have considered it a panacea of sorts, triggering a bunch of different stuff that helped overall health, but keep in mind this was something to tune of 150 years ago, so the information he was working with may have limited the scope of his understanding. For all his otherwise infamous reputation, his work aboard the Belgica was nothing short of pioneering for the time. His life after that expedition over-shadows any positive contributions to science he made, unfortunately.

[ankitml]

Vitamin D is not an outcome of standing by fire. It is from UV spectrum which is entirely absent from fires. It needs high temperature fire like fusion to be emitted. Totally doable by sun but not by your campfire.

[relaxing]

As placebos go, feeling toasty warm has to be way up there.

[Angostura]

There maybe a thousand studies.

How many well-designed double-blind studies in humans? That’s the question

[ankitml]

i dont know what you mean by science. There are literally 1000s of research papers showing mitochondrial "horsepower" with red light on every type of tissue. Cells heal themselves as first thing when they get extra energy. Do you want your neighborhood clinic to validate before trying some light samples out?