‘It sounds like witchcraft’: can light therapy really give you better skin, cleaner teeth, stronger joints?

Light therapy is clearly enjoying a wave of attention. There are now available glowing gadgets for everything from skin conditions and wrinkles to muscle pain and gum disease, the latest being a toothbrush outfitted with miniature red light sources, marketed by the company as “a breakthrough for domestic dental hygiene.” Worldwide, the market was worth $1bn in 2024 and is projected to grow to $1.8bn by 2035. Options include full-body infrared sauna sessions, where instead of hot coals (real or electric) heating the air, the infrared radiation heats your body itself. Based on supporter testimonials, it’s like bathing in one of those LED-lit beauty masks, stimulating skin elasticity, soothing sore muscles, reducing swelling and chronic health conditions as well as supporting brain health.

Understanding the Evidence

“It sounds a bit like witchcraft,” observes a Durham University professor, professor in neuroscience at Durham University and a convert to the value of light therapy. Naturally, certain impacts of light on human physiology are proven. Our bodies produce vitamin D through sun exposure, essential for skeletal strength, immune function, and muscular health. Natural light synchronizes our biological clocks, additionally, triggering the release of neurochemicals and hormones while we are awake, and signaling the body to slow down for nighttime. Daylight-simulating devices frequently help individuals with seasonal depression to boost low mood in winter. Undoubtedly, light plays a vital role in human health.

Various Phototherapy Approaches

Although mood lamps generally utilize blue-spectrum frequencies, consumer light therapy products mostly feature red and infrared emissions. In serious clinical research, such as Chazot’s investigations into the effects of infrared on brain cells, determining the precise frequency is essential. Light constitutes electromagnetic energy, which runs the spectrum from the lowest-energy, longest wavelengths (radio waves) to the highest-energy (gamma waves). Phototherapy, or light therapy employs mid-spectrum wavelengths, with ultraviolet representing the higher energy invisible light, followed by visible light encompassing rainbow colors and infrared light visible through night vision technology.

Ultraviolet treatment has been employed by skin specialists for decades for addressing long-term dermatological issues like vitiligo. It affects cellular immune responses, “and reduces inflammatory processes,” explains a skin specialist. “There’s lots of evidence for phototherapy.” UVA reaches deeper skin layers compared to UVB, whereas the LEDs we see on consumer light-therapy devices (usually producing colored light emissions) “tend to be a bit more superficial.”

Safety Protocols and Medical Guidance

The side-effects of UVB exposure, like erythema or pigmentation, are understood but clinical devices employ restricted wavelength ranges – signifying focused frequency bands – which decreases danger. “Treatment is monitored by medical staff, meaning intensity is regulated,” explains the dermatologist. And crucially, the lightbulbs are calibrated by medical technicians, “to guarantee appropriate wavelength emission – as opposed to commercial tanning facilities, where oversight might be limited, and emission spectra aren’t confirmed.”

Home Devices and Scientific Uncertainty

Colored light diodes, he explains, “aren’t typically employed clinically, though they might benefit some issues.” Red wavelength therapy, proponents claim, enhance blood flow, oxygen utilization and dermal rejuvenation, and stimulate collagen production – a key aspiration in anti-ageing effects. “Studies are available,” says Ho. “However, it’s limited.” Regardless, given the plethora of available tools, “we don’t know whether or not the lights emitted are reflective of the research that has been done. We don’t know the duration, proper positioning requirements, the risk-benefit ratio. Numerous concerns persist.”

Treatment Areas and Specialist Views

Initial blue-light devices addressed acne bacteria, microorganisms connected to breakouts. Research support isn’t sufficient for standard medical recommendation – even though, notes the dermatologist, “it’s commonly used in cosmetic clinics.” Certain patients incorporate it into their regimen, he observes, however for consumer products, “we just tell them to try it carefully and to make sure it has been assessed for safety. Without proper medical classification, oversight remains ambiguous.”

Cutting-Edge Studies and Biological Processes

Meanwhile, in advanced research areas, scientists have been studying cerebral tissue, revealing various pathways for light-enhanced cell function. “Nearly every test with precise light frequencies demonstrated advantageous outcomes,” he says. Multiple claimed advantages have created skepticism toward light treatment – that it’s too good to be true. But his research has thoroughly changed his mind in that respect.

Chazot mostly works on developing drug treatments for neurodegenerative diseases, though twenty years earlier, a doctor developing photonic antiviral treatment consulted his scientific background. “He designed tools for biological testing,” he explains. “I was pretty sceptical. It was an unusual wavelength of about 1070 nanometres, which most thought had no biological effect.”

Its beneficial characteristic, nevertheless, was its ability to transmit through aqueous environments, meaning it could penetrate the body more deeply.

Mitochondrial Effects and Brain Health

Additional research indicated infrared affected cellular mitochondria. Mitochondria are the powerhouses of cells, creating power for cellular operations. “Every cell in your body has mitochondria, even within brain tissue,” explains the neuroscientist, who prioritized neurological investigations. “Research confirms improved brain blood flow with phototherapy, which is generally advantageous.”

With 1070 treatment, energy organelles generate minimal reactive oxygen compounds. At controlled levels these compounds, explains the expert, “triggers guardian proteins that maintain organelle health, look after your cells and also deal with the unwanted proteins.”

All of these mechanisms appear promising for treating a brain disease: free radical neutralization, swelling control, and waste removal – autophagy being the process the cell uses to clear unwanted damaging proteins.

Current Research Status and Professional Opinions

When recently reviewing 1070nm research for cognitive decline, he states, about 400 people were taking part in four studies, incorporating his preliminary American studies