An Introduction to Human Biophoton Emission

Abstract

Background: Biophoton emission is the spontaneous emission of ultraweak light emanating from all living systems, including man. The emission is linked to the endogenous production of excited states within the living system. The detection and characterisation of human biophoton emission has led to suggestions that it has potential future applications in medicine. Objectives: An overview is presented of studies on ultraweak photon emission (UPE, biophotons) from the human whole body. Methods: Electronic searches of Medline, PsychLit, PubMed and references lists of relevant review articles and books were used to establish the literature database. Articles were then analysed for their main experimental setup and results. Results: The, mostly, single case studies have resulted in a collection of observations. The collection presents information on the following fields of research: (1) influence of biological rhythms, age, and gender on emission, (2) the intensity of emission and its left-right symmetry in health and disease, (3) emission from the perspective of Traditional Chinese and Korean Medicine, (4) emission in different consciousness studies, (5) procedures for analysis of the photon signal from hands, (6) detection of peroxidative processes in the skin. Of each article the main findings are presented in a qualitative manner, quantitative data are presented where useful, and the technological or methodological limitations are discussed. Conclusion: Photon emission recording techniques have reached a stage that allows resolution of the signal in time and space. The published material is presented and includes aspects like spatial resolution of intensity, its relation to health and disease, the aspect of colour, and methods for analysis of the photon signal. The limited number of studies only allows first conclusions about the implications and significance of biophotons in relation to health and disease, or to mental states, or acupuncture. However, with the present data we consider that further research in the field is justified.

A Possible Mechanism of Action for the Placebo Response: Human Biofield Activation Via Therapeutic Ritual

“…Popp, Gu, and Li reported (1994) that colonies of single celled organisms adjusted their populations to a size that allows them to retain the most biophotonic light within the colony. Similarly, healthy people's cells retain more light in the form of biophotons than do the cells of unhealthy people (Popp, 2008;van Wijk & van Wijk, 2005). This is consistent with the finding that cancerous tissues emit more biophotons than do their neighboring, healthy tissues, which retain biophotons (Popp, 2009;Schamhart & van Wijk, 1987;Scholz et al, 1988).…”

“…Assessment of biophotonic activity shows promise as a diagnostic tool within the Western medical model (Brownstein et al, 2007;Ives et al, 2014), with significant differences in photon emission patterns having been found between healthy and diseased organisms (van Wijk & van Wijk, 2005). Differences in biophoton emission rates also appear between groups of healthy cells and cancer cells, with increasing emission rates correlated with increasing malignancy of tumor cells (Popp, 2009;Schamhart & van Wijk, 1987;Scholz, Staszkiewicz, Popp, & Nagl, 1988).…”

Further Observations on Visual Perception: The Influence of Pathologies Upon the Absorption of Light and Emission of Bioluminescence

“…This emission of bioluminescence may have significant diagnostic potential [76]. Light influences the function of all cellular processes however the absorption of light may be primarily a therapeutic principle i.e.…”

Spectral discrimination between healthy people and cold patients using spontaneous photon emission

“…All the biological systems, including humans, send ultra-weak photon emission (UPE) to their surroundings [1], and spontaneous ultra-weak photon emission is generated from the relaxation of electronically excited species formed during oxidative metabolic processes [2][3][4][5].Ultra-weak photon emission is a common phenomenon and carries information about its generating processes, and closely related to photosynthesis, lipid per-oxidation, catabolism, free radical reactions, radiation effects, detoxification and carcinogenic effects, aging and death process [6]. There has been a lot of evidence that the features of UPE including intensity, spectral distribution, photon count distribution, photon spatial distribution, and photon statistical properties contain and carry information about the biological systems that result in its production [7].…”