Near-Infrared Is a Source of Fuel for Your Body

Near-Infrared Is a Source of Fuel for Your Body

Near-infrared light is thought
to work by interacting with
cytochrome c oxidase (COO)
— one of the proteins
in the inner mitochondrial membrane and
a member of the electron transport chain.

COO is a chromophore — a molecule that attracts and feeds on light.

When you eat food,
the nutrients nourish your cells and
provide fuel for biological functions.
But this actually occurs indirectly,
and food is not your body's sole source of fuel.
Light is also a source.
The macronutrients
you get from your food
are broken down
in your gut.
From there,
they enter your bloodstream,
which allows them to circulate
throughout your body,
nourishing all of your body's cells.

A key component that
allows this system to work is
that essential ingredients like fats and glucose
are broken down
into pyruvate
that feeds your mitochondria,
thereby allowing the mitochondria
to process electrons
to generate the ATP required for
all of these biological processes.

As for light as a source of fuel,
about 40 percent of the energy
in sunlight is near-infrared.

Unfortunately,
few clinicians have any idea
that light is a powerful fuel for your body.

In my view,
this ignorance is one of the reasons
why Alzheimer's disease is skyrocketing in prevalence,
as so many are routinely avoiding sensible sun exposure.

Infrared Light Triggers Cellular Repair

Photobiomodulation also improves oxygenation to your cells.
One of the ways it does this is
by releasing nitric oxide (NO) back into your body
after being exposed to red and near-infrared rays.

NO is a vasodilator that
helps relax your blood vessels,
lower your blood pressure and
improve vascular health.

Interestingly,
when you deliver red and infrared light
to the mitochondria,
it not only triggers NO release,
it also promotes synthesizing of gene transcription factors
that trigger cellular repair —
and this is as true in the brain as anywhere else in your body.

In fact,
along with your heart,
your brain is one of the most mitochondrial-dense tissues in your body,
and therefore stand to benefit a great deal from infrared exposure.

"[I]f you look at the epidemiology of dementia and Alzheimer's globally … countries that are in the northern hemisphere appear to have high risk of developing dementia and Alzheimer's. You look at the top 10 countries, they're all countries with winter, with shorter hours," Lim says.

You're an advocate of being in the sunlight. I think that is really what people ought to do. But in the north, there's not enough sun, right? In a way, what we're doing here, directing light into the brain … has a … similar effect as sunlight, but more targeted.

It has specific wavelengths that have an effect on the mitochondria of the neurons. Logically, that will lead to neuronal recovery if the neurons are performing sub-optimally or are damaged. That's been found in in vitro studies.

Before we did the study on humans, there were already at least three published studies of work done on mice and rabbits. When they directed red and infrared light to the brain, they found that the commonly accepted biomarkers, the amyloid beta plaques, were reduced. The behavior got better … [W]e are the first to complete an albeit small study on humans that has given us a very significant result.

When we did a head-to-head comparison with the drugs (with the information we had from the pivotal trial with Aricept, which is commonly prescribed for Alzheimer's), the data we got was seven times greater, with no side effect. I think the key is not having a side effect. The safety is pretty much confirmed …

This next trial we're doing involves 226 people. It's randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled … led by a professor of epidemiology at the University of Toronto. We'll have collaborators from Harvard and Boston University … In the meantime, we are also doing a small study to get quicker data from about 40 people, which is also rigorously controlled."

[출처 : http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2017/03/05/photobiomodulation-alzheimers-disease.aspx ]