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The policies to limit spreading of COVID-19 is ‘stay home’ and ‘work from home’. The consequence is that most people see very little daylight. While it is very important to stay home as much as possible and keep ‘social distance’ all the time, in the Netherlands it is not forbidden to go outside. The Dutch online news site ‘Dokters van Morgen’ published an article to emphasize the importance of getting enough daytime light exposure to keep the biological clock on track, for good sleep quality at night, and better mood. Read the tips (in Dutch) how to see enough Good Light while at the same time stick to the guidelines of the government to limit spreading COVID-19. For more information see https://zorgnu.avrotros.nl/hulp/hulpartikelen/item/werk-je-thuis-voldoende-daglicht-krijgen-is-belangrijk/

In his article (below) in the Dutch magazine “Endocrinology” (credits to tijdschrift Endocrinologie, https://endocrinologie.nl), dr. Aart Mudde sketches the underestimated attention for the epiphysic-hypothalamic system in medical practice. This system is influenced by light and for some critical health aspects high intensities are needed like from sun light, which is missing indoors. The epiphysic-hypothalamic system plays a role in melatonin production and disturbances in melatonin production probably links with diseases like hypertension, diabetes and Alzheimer. Because most of us spend our lives in biological darkness, our inner “Zeitgeber” the SCN which encodes for the circadian rhythm is chronically ‘ill’. There is a relative simple solution: more light indoors during daytime, exactly what the Good Light Group is promoting.

The annual Lighting conference of LED professionals in Bregenz, LpS2020, has been cancelled because of COVID-19. But LpS goes Digital! On September 22nd, 2020 the first digital lighting conference and exhibition will be organized. For more information go to https://www.led-professional-symposium.com/. Or join the conference and/or the exhibition on https://lnkd.in/gkX9zdW. The Good Light Group has been invited to organize one of the digital lectures.

On February 19th, an interesting article was published in the Dutch newspaper NRC with Marijke Gordijn, Board member of the Good Light Group. It describes the importance of good light in office environments. Lighting is often treated as of low importance in offices, but good light can have an enormous influence on sleep quality, alertness during daytime and mood. It is a big contributor to well-being of people. To avoid biological darkness indoors during the day, the lighting levels need to be at least five times higher than the current practice in indoor lighting. This is estimated to be 1000 lux vertical at the level of the eye. For a link to this Dutch article see: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2020/02/19/goed-licht-daar-word-je-beter-van-a3991039 #goodlightgroup #goodlight #lightforwellbeing #biologicaldarkness #humancentriclighting.

Today, we welcomed the Eindhoven University of Technology, TU/e, as Participant of the Good Light Group. We are very proud that the TU/e’s Intelligent Lighting Institute (ILI) supports our foundation. The Intelligent Lighting Institute is one of the important knowledge centres in the world on all aspects of light. ILI’s mission is to search for revolutionary lighting solutions. To get an impression of the wide range of research in the Intelligent Lighting Institute, you can have a look at: https://www.tue.nl/en/research/research-institutes/top-research-groups/intelligent-lighting-institute/research/sound-lighting/ At the campus of the Eindhoven University of Technology, the Board members Jan Denneman and Bruno Smets met with Jos Hermus, the managing director of ILI, to sign the Participants Agreement. We are looking forward to a productive cooperation!

On January 29th, 2020 the board of the Good Light Group and the participants met in person for the first Participant Council meeting. Representatives of Seaborough, Signify and Sparckel were present. Claude Gronfier from Inserm, Roelof Hut from the University of Groningen, and representatives from Toshiba Material were unfortunately absent, all with good reasons. Nevertheless the first meeting was a great success. The board presented an overview of the activities since founding in May 2019 and the strategic plans for the future. Detailed ideas for the year 2020 were explained and discussed. The participants present supported the installation of a first chair of the council, who needs to be confirmed by the participants who were absent, to reach a majority voting. In addition, the idea to create two working groups, one to develop a communication plan and one to create guidelines and functional descriptions of Good Light based on scientific data, were supported and several participants already agreed to take a role. At the end of the meeting, everybody left with a very enthusiastic and positive feeling, convinced of the fact that there is work to be done!

Trends in Lighting asks 20 Questions to inspirational lighting industry minds to mark the end of the decade Name: Marijke C.M. Gordijn Job Title: Member and co-founder of the Good Light Group, director of Chrono@Work Where will you spend the holidays? Quietly at home with my family at some time and visiting family members and friends to celebrate together at other times What is your favourite Christmas food? A delicious surprise dinner at my sister’s home, looking forward to this year again! What are you most excited about for 2020? To see the message of Good Light really reach people all over the world. And to see Europe taking the wise decision that each country should adopt permanent standard time in accordance with their time zone to support our health. What do you most want to see from lighting manufacturers in 2020? Lighting manufacturers should really learn about the right light at the right time: Good Light. They need to understand that for non-visual effects, color temperature is not the correct measure, it does not tell you anything about the spectral composition of the light source and in that sense is irrelevant for the non-visual effects. Based on correct principles they need to develop lighting systems of high quality for homes and offices that are easy to use to really improve the life of people: make them sleep better at night and live better and healthier during the day. Have you already booked your summer vacation? Oh no! During working days and working weeks your days are often completely organized: meetings, tasks, travel, timetables, sport, social agenda. Summer vacation is a time to relax without schedules and without hurry. I like to go with the flow during days off, no time schedule, no alarm clock, no obligations. We will see what summer 2020 will bring us and where we go. Who is your industry inspiration? All those companies that try to implement Good Light into their systems, based on scientific evidence. They are not with so many at the moment, but they are early adopters, trying to really change things. It is a difficult job. Which product has inspired you in 2019? A light cafe opened in the Netherlands where depressed people are treated with light; it lowers the threshold to get a proper treatment. Which project are you most proud of? We are currently working on a concept to improve the live and hopefully health of shift workers. Not only with respect to light, but also to other lifestyle aspects we think we can make a difference. Working at night is against our biological clock and is unhealthy. We need to work on healthy concepts now that we know more about the mechanisms behind the health risks. Can you name another reindeer besides Rudolph? No, but I think of the paper published in 2005 just before Christmas. In that paper our colleagues show the arrhythmic behavior of reindeer during the long winter-months without light. It clearly shows the important role of a regular natural light-dark cycle to keep our rhythms in synch. Do you own a Christmas jumper? In the Netherlands, I don’t think many people have a Christmas jumper, but some are wearing a ‘foute trui’, you can search for ‘foute kersttrui’, to see what I mean. I don’t have one! How is sustainability changing your job? Good Light means higher intensities of indoor light needed during daytime. I am nota technician, but I do understand that if you add more electrical light this is not really sustainable. But I do think we can come up with other alternatives as well: develop ways to bring more outdoor light into homes and offices, and…we need less light in the evenings and at night, so reduce light there which is both better for our ecological footprint and for our health. What is your most listened to track this year? Father and friend from Alain Clark. What was the last good film you watched? It is a long time ago that I watched a good film, cannot come up with a name right now. But I am currently watching the third season of The Crown, a nice insight in the life of the royal family of the United Kingdom led by queen Elizabeth for already 67 years. Have you already booked your flights to Trends in Lighting 22-24 September 2020? No need to fly, Bregenz is not that far. And yes, I will be there again! We are discussing to organize an interesting program with several practical talks and experiences with Good Light! Where was the most interesting place your job took you this year? Bregenz of course…. 😉, but the meeting of the SLTBR in Chicago was great too. Will Brexit happen? I don’t know and I stopped following this soap. What is your favourite Christmas song? White Christmas from Bill Cosby. It is so sweet, but it reminds me of old days with my parents. We do not have so many white Christmases in the Netherlands anymore, but I had a very nice one in Bavaria, a long time ago How do you say Merry Christmas in another language? Gelukkig Kerstfeest in Dutch Do you prefer LED Christmas lights or the traditional incandescent bulbs? Very tiny, small, warm white LED Christmas lights in a green tree. I got used to it. Originally real candles were of course the best. Can you remember the job/course you were you doing 20 years ago? Oh yes, that was a beautiful and power-woman year for me, 1999. I gave birth to my twins, less than 3 months after defending my thesis on the role of the biological clock and sleep in depression at the Medical Faculty of the University of Groningen and I just started to head the human chronobiological facility at the Biology department. Chrono@Work is still collaborating with the scientists from the Chronobiology department of the University of Groningen. I am really looking forward to translate all the scientific knowledge we collect about what Good Light is and how we should implement it in the upcoming years. Bron: https://www.trends.lighting/20trendsinlightingqs2020

A short video on the non-visual effects of light, explained by our president Jan Denneman. The Austrian online television channel A1now has issued a series about light: “let there be light”. The first episode explains the importance of good light for human well-being and health. This series is made by Stefan Yazzie Herbert.

Een groot deel van de Nederlanders zit te veel in het duister. Ze krijgen te weinig daglicht en het licht binnen is niet sterk genoeg. Helemaal nu de wintertijd voor de deur staat en de dagen korter worden. Een gebrek aan licht heeft invloed op ons humeur en onze slaap en kan daardoor allerlei gezondheidsklachten veroorzaken. Daarom moet er volgens deskundigen veel meer aandacht komen voor het effect van licht op onze gezondheid. Dagje buitenlucht Chronobiologe Marijke Gordijn, oprichter van Chrono@Work en gastmedewerker van de Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, verdiept zich in de afstelling en werking van de menselijke biologische klok. Licht is daar een essentieel onderdeel van. Als je overdag meer daglicht tot je neemt, slaap je 's avonds beter. "Zoals mensen vaak lekker slapen na een dagje in de buitenlucht", zegt Gordijn tegen RTL Nieuws. "Het gaat niet zozeer om langer slapen, maar om de kwaliteit van de slaap", zegt Gordijn. "Hoe snel je in slaap valt, hoe vaak je tijdens de nacht wakker wordt en hoe diep je slaapt; de kwaliteit van je slaap heeft een enorm effect op je lichaam." "Als je slecht slaapt verandert bijvoorbeeld je hormoonhuishouding, waardoor je meer risico loopt op obesitas", legt ze uit. "En er zijn directe verbindingen tussen je ogen en het hersengebied dat je stemming regelt. Onvoldoende licht beïnvloedt je stemming negatief en kan zelfs tot depressies leiden." Wat kun je zelf doen? Chronobiologe Marijke Gordijn heeft een paar praktische adviezen om meer licht tot je te nemen en de kans op een winterdip te verkleinen: Ga elke ochtend tussen 08.00 en 09.00 uur een half uurtje naar buiten Ga met de lunch naar buiten Werk je binnen, ga dan zo dicht mogelijk bij het raam zitten De verlichting thuis kan je sterker maken, maar dan heb je wel speciale lampen nodig die niet in de supermarkt te vinden zijn Het werkt om in de winter een paar dagen naar een zonnige bestemming te gaan Blijf niet elke avond binnen om onder een deken tv te kijken; doe ook activiteiten buitenshuis en trotseer de kou Zorg dat je voldoende slaap krijgt. Gordijn en haar collega's hebben hun bevindingen al met drie verschillende studies vastgesteld. "We weten ook dat de werknemers van kantoren waar met kunstlicht daglicht wordt nagebootst, beter slapen", zegt ze. Mensen die in beter licht werken, zijn fitter en alerter en hun stemming is beter. Op kantoren moet de lichtsterkte op je bureaublad volgens de Arbowet 500 lux zijn. Maar dat is veel te weinig, volgens Gordijn. "We moeten richting een lichtsterkte van 1000 lux op het oog om profijt te hebben van licht." 1000 lux? Lux is de eenheid voor lichtsterkte, waarbij 1000 lux gelijk staat aan wat er op je oog komt op een heel donkere winterdag. Bewolkte nacht zonder maan: 0,0001 lux Volle maan: 0,1 lux Schemering: 10 lux In huis op een erg donkere dag: 100 lux Kantoor: 300 tot 500 lux Bewolkte dag: 4000 lux Indirect zonlicht overdag: 10.000 tot 20.000 lux Direct zonlicht overdag: 100.000 tot 130.000 lux Er moet dus meer aandacht komen voor licht. "Je moet of het daglicht beter naar binnen brengen, of de verlichting naar een hogere intensiteit brengen", aldus Gordijn. En dat laatste kan tegenwoordig met speciale lampen. Het Eindhovense bedrijf Sparckel maakt naar eigen zeggen het eerste 'vrijstaande biodynamische lichtsysteem ter wereld met technologie die de kracht van natuurlijk daglicht evenaart'. Schijf van vijf Directeur en oprichter Maarten Voorhuis gaat zelfs zover dat licht bij de schijf van vijf zou moeten horen. "We weten niet hoe goed we ons eigenlijk kunnen voelen." "Biodynamisch betekent dat het licht zich aanpast aan het moment van de dag", legt Voorhuis uit. Dat betekent dat je door de ingebouwde tijdsklok van het lichtsysteem 's ochtends meer blauw en 's avonds meer rood licht krijgt. Op die manier krijg je het juiste licht op het juiste moment en slaap je beter. Onprettig fel Voorhuis vervolgt: "Ik ben eerst samen met wetenschappers de formule van gezond licht gaan ontrafelen. Daar kwam uit dat mensen 1000 lux op het oog nodig hebben. Wij zijn vervolgens gaan kijken hoe we dat konden bereiken, zonder dat mensen in onprettig fel licht komen te zitten." Voorhuis en chronobiologe Gordijn zijn niet de enigen die vinden dat er meer aandacht moet komen voor het belang van licht. Jan Denneman, die meer dan 40 jaar bij Philips Lighting werkte, richtte onlangs de Good Light Group op, een non-profitstichting die het belang van daglicht wil benadrukken. "In de Good Light Group zitten wetenschappers, chronobiologen, architecten en bedrijven", zegt Denneman. "Er zijn ongeveer 1000 deskundigen op het gebied van licht en gezondheid in de wereld. Er wordt onderling veel over gesproken op congressen. Maar het wordt nu tijd dat deze informatie ook naar het grote publiek gaat." 'Tuinman worden' "Iedereen weet dat je niet moet roken, dat schone lucht belangrijk is en ga zo maar door. Maar hoe belangrijk licht is, dat weet niemand", zegt Denneman. De Good Light Group moet dat gaan veranderen. Omdat we volgens Denneman tegenwoordig 90 procent van onze tijd binnen doorbrengen, krijgt bijna niemand genoeg licht. "Eigenlijk kun je het beste tuinman worden", zegt hij. "Maar dat kunnen we nu eenmaal niet allemaal worden." Bron: https://www.rtlz.nl/life/lifestyle/artikel/4889306/licht-daglicht-winterdepressie-kantoor-slaap-stemming-concentratie

Lecture “nutritional light and well-being” on 17 June 2019 at the International School on Light Sciences and Technologies, by Jan Denneman, chairman Good Light Group. This year’s theme was Light in Sources, Health and Medicine – University of Santander, Spain.

The new Good Light Group wants to rebrand healthy lighting, and give it a kick. Believing that the human-centric lighting movement is lacking momentum, a new advocacy group has emerged to help give things a kick, and has started by rebranding the concept as “nutritional light.” The non-profit Good Light Group, based in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, aims “to promote the importance of nutritional light on the wellbeing of people,” the foundation said upon its formal launch earlier this month on the International Day of Light, May 16. Many lighting companies are promoting systems that tune LED lights to brightness and spectral levels that suit human health and circadian rhythms. While the science of lighting for health and wellbeing continues to develop amid debate over its details, the general notion is that bright light and blue-enriched light stimulates, and dimmer and amber hues relax. Applying the concepts at the right time can help with things like stimulation, concentration, and rest, while the wrong light can undermine those activities and damage human health. Lighting companies are indeed winning installations based on healthy lighting principles, such as at the Crowne Plaza Atlanta Airport; and they continue to invest in research trials on currently available commercial technology, as evidenced by a recently reported study utilizing Seoul Semiconductor LED technology at the University of Basel. But the Good Light Group believes that progress has been too slow. “The issue is human-centric lighting is not a factor of any significance in the market,” founder and chairman Jan Denneman told LEDs Magazine. He noted that the Good Light Group will take a different tack from those used by industry groups such as the Global Lighting Association (GLA), Europe’s LightingEurope, and Britain’s Lighting Industry Association, among others, all of which he claimed have so far come up short. “The Good Light Group will try it in a new way, especially by making the benefits known to a wide public,” Denneman said. “First of all, we are using the term nutritional light,” he continued. “Light is as important as nutrition for the body and brain as vitamins, proteins, minerals. Billions of people are now in light that does not stimulate body and brain. Our objective is that they can enjoy nutritional light. The technology is available, the evidence that it helps better health and wellbeing is given.” Industry veteran Denneman has been a longtime advocate of healthy lighting, having helped put human-centric lighting on the 2017 10-year roadmap for LightingEurope, where he served as president. Two years ago, while at LightingEurope, he told LEDs that human-centric lighting “requires a paradigm shift in our thinking, in the manufacturers’ thinking, in the regulators’ thinking, and even probably in the thinking of our customers.” It’s fair to note that LEDs will feature an article by LightingEurope insiders in an upcoming issue, which will outline updates on the efforts to guide policy development and proposed industry strategy that are expected to advance lighting for health and wellbeing. Denneman left LightingEurope last year, about a year after leaving a 10-year stint as president of the GLA. He also retired in January last year from Signify, then called Philips Lighting, after more than 42 years at the company. “I retired from Philips, but I am definitely not retired from lighting — I have a mission,” Denneman told LEDs. MARK HALPER is a contributing editor for LEDs Magazine, and an energy, technology, and business journalist (markhalper@aol.com). Bron: https://www.ledsmagazine.com/smart-lighting-iot/white-point-tuning/article/14033985/former-philips-lighting-executive-founds-organization-dedicated-to-healthy-light

The Good Light Group, an international non-profit foundation to promote the importance of nutritional light on the well-being of people has been formed, on the 2019 International Day of Light (May 16th). Nutritional light is natural daylight or electric light, with beneficial effects on the human body and brain. The foundation aims to achieve its goal by stimulating the use of attractive, pleasant, effective and sustainable nutritional light in buildings, and by demonstrating its beneficial effects. In the past two decades, convincing scientific evidence has emerged that light is not only important for vision, but also has a major influence on, among other things, the biological rhythms of humans, their sleep, mood, and functioning; the so called ‘non-visual effects’ of light. Hence light is a crucial factor for achieving good health and quality of life. Most people work, study, shop, etc. in an indoor environment, where light levels are usually good enough to see, but are far lower and much different in quality from natural daylight where humans evolved. Light levels and quality in indoor environments during daytime are often too low to effectively stimulate the beneficial non-visual effects on humans. Thus not supporting a healthy development and functioning of the body and brain. Modern lighting offers enormous possibilities to approximate the stimulating effects of natural daylight during the day and prevent deleterious effects of relatively high indoor light levels during the evening and night. However, these possibilities are not yet being exploited to offer the dynamics of daylight, or bring interior lighting to the appropriate levels and quality, to support a healthy body and brain. The principal goals of the Good Light Group are to raise awareness of the benefits for the human body and brain of a daily dose of nutritional light at the appropriate time and to help ensure that as many people as possible are in buildings equipped with nutritional light. “Nutritional light is the most unexploited factor capable of contributing to quality of life and well-being. New technologies are now available for implementing nutritional light in our lighting installations to the benefit of billions of people with an indoor job, so let’s start now!”, said Jan Denneman, chairman of the board of the Good Light Group. The Good Light Group will conduct its work by enlisting the support of research institutions, organisations with an interest in promoting nutritional light and companies that are interested in realising nutritional light projects. Those with an interest in contributing to the Good Light Group may contact the chairman of the board, Mr Jan Denneman, at info@goodlightgroup.org. Bron: https://www.trends.lighting/good-light-group-formed-to-promote-nutritional-light