Wednesday, August 29, 2012

IMPACT ON LIGHT ON OUR HEALTH AND WELFARE


Lighting has an impact on how we live our life’s but recently scientist have learned that light actually physically effects our health and welfare. There is a receptor cell in our eyes that help tell us what time of day it is and the amount of melatonin that our body should produce which is the chemical that makes us sleepy at night and awake in the day. Along with the receptor cell our body benefits from sunlight and if we don’t receive enough it contributed to a condition called SAD that is due to an unbalance of chemical in our body. However light must be controlled for levels of glare and discomfort because while light needs to be a part of our life’s and unbalance of one type of light can lead to a higher chance of cancer.

Research has found that while light is good there are many bad effects many of which involve our sleep cycle and how our body produces chemicals to relax us and make us go to sleep at night. This over exposure to light throws off our daily routine and rhythm that lets us naturally know the time of the day.  Along with the side effects that make it hard to sleep a study found that the effects of bright light late in the afternoon before bed cause weight gain because it hinders the production of a hormone that slows down the breakdown of our daily calories.

Light is a very good thing and can have many positive benefits as well as negative ones so therefore we must control the amount of light we are receiving and help to manage others by the types of lighting we use for spaces we design. 

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