Scientific Reports: Evidence of Lighting Impact on Human
Background photo by Ion Fet on Unsplash
Improving indoor lighting conditions at the workplace has the potential to support proper circadian entrainment of hormonal rhythms, sleep, and well-being, as reported in a paper by Marta Benedetti et al. in a paper published by Nature Scientific Reports.
Lighting conditions at our workplace may impact our body more than we think. In their study, the authors present physiological evidence collected during an extended study involving 34 participants.
Marta Benedetti et al. tested the effects of optimized dynamic daylight and electric lighting on circadian phase of melatonin, cortisol and skin temperatures in office workers. They equipped one office room with an automated controller for blinds and electric lighting, optimized for dynamic lighting (= Test room), and a second room without any automated control (= Reference room). Young healthy participants spent five consecutive workdays in each room, where individual light exposure data, skin temperatures and saliva samples for melatonin and cortisol assessments were collected. The findings suggest that optimized dynamic workplace lighting has the potential to promote earlier melatonin onset and peripheral heat loss prior bedtime, which may be beneficial for persons with a delayed circadian timing system.
Related article:
https://actu.epfl.ch/news/better-use-of-office-daylighting-can-improve-peo-3/
This research has been partly financed by the Swiss Innovation Agency Innosuisse under the SCCER Future Energy Efficient Buildings & Districts (FEEB&D) and partly by the Board of the Swiss Federal Institutes under the project NEST SolAce ‘Perception-based Human Comfort through a Multi-Functional Solar Facade and Renewable Energy Integration’ at EMPA (Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology).
Benedetti, M., Maierová, L., Cajochen, C., Scartezzini, J.-L., Münch, M. Optimized office lighting advances melatonin phase and peripheral heat loss prior bedtime. Sci Rep 12, 4267 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-07522-8