Augmentation of cognitive brain functions with transcranial lasers

journal.frontiersin.org

30 points·md224··9 comments

Or, you could sit outside on a sunny day.

"the light intensities on the brain surface during OT obtained by using a commercially available system were about 2% for adults and 3% for neonates of those values obtained under midday sunlight on a sunny day in midsummer"

http://biomedicaloptics.spiedigitallibrary.org/article.aspx?... [Journal of Biomedical Optics 2007]

As I understand it, the LLLT systems in question are usually focused on a fairly narrow range of wavelengths (this times into the postulated cytochrome mechanism: it only absorbs light energy at a few wavelengths), not smeared all over the infrared and visible and UV like sunlight.

The article actually notes that higher power densities showed a much smaller effect. Low doses were much more effectual, which is why sitting outside on a sunny day may not work quite as well, if at all.

For a broader overview of Low Level Laser Therapy:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3288797/

So is this just heating areas of the brain? If bone isn't transparent to infra-red (I have no idea...), then it has to be, right?

Thermal radiation is by definition sort of wideband (so it basically heats the surface without much penetration), this is apperently narrowband radiation over some penetration window targeted at a specific photon absorption mechanism in cells, which showed the described results.

Puts on brain power helmet

We live in a crazy world.

> brain power helmet

No need to invent new names for things. We already have the term "thinking cap". :)

Imagine a future where all programming workstations came with one of these. Sit down, helmet up, then code like a boss.

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