Get the winter blues? Have trouble waking up in the morning or falling asleep at night?
You may not be getting enough blue light -- or, you may be getting too much.
Lowbluelights.com, a company formed five years ago as a spinoff from research conducted at John Carroll University, says it has products for all of those situations.
Richard L. Hansler, co-owner of Lowbluelights.com and director of the
Lighting Innovations Institute at John Carroll, says the power of blue light came to, um, light in 2001 when scientists discovered that the blue part of the spectrum can affect the production of melatonin -- a hormone that helps you sleep.
Hansler, a retired veteran of the lighting industry, says the company was formed after he was approached to develop an LED light to treat seasonal affective disorder, or SAD -- a sometimes debilitating bout of winter depression. There is some medical evidence that exposure to blue light can help lessen the problem, he explains.
Likewise, blue light can suppress melatonin, causing a person exposed to the light in the evening to have trouble falling asleep -- just as it can help erase grogginess in the morning, he says. There is circumstancial evidence that melatonin suppresses some forms of cancer, Hansler says. To those ends, the company sells a host of products to either boost more blue light or filter it out.
Lowbluelights.com's most recent product, a filter placed over the screen of the iPad, was launched after some users complained of insomnia after using the iPad, Hansler says. The company's most popular products, however, are glasses worn before bedtime to filter out blue light, allowing the natural production of melatonin.
The company has three employees and is headquartered in University Heights.
Source: Richard Hansler, Lowbluelights.comWriter: Gene Monteith