Lifax’s bacteria-killing smart bulbs work, but here is the small print

Lifx clean There is a new smart lightbulb with a tricky twist. Not only is it a fully functional color-changing lightbulb, the company also claims that it is capable of disinfecting surfaces and around it. First announced last August, the $ 69.99 Lifx Clean is now shipping to preorder customers in the US, with widespread availability planned this spring.

LifeX has its own lab tests as well as an array of scientific studies to support its study, stating that Clean is “the world’s first antibacterial, disinfectant smart light.” But can the lightbulb work even in the average household as it did in the lab?

It is no coincidence that Lifx announced the bulb in a year in which all of us had to pay more attention than before to keep ourselves and our homes clean. Lifex CEO David McLauchlan says the company had an initial discussion last March about developing products such as LifeX Clean, the same month COVID-19 was officially declared an epidemic by the World Health Organization.

“We saw that liquor companies were making hand sanitizers and clothing companies were making facial masks, and I told the team that we can’t do these things, but we light up,” McClellan said in a call. “There’s this technology there, why don’t we look into it and figure out if we can do that?”

McLauchlan is referring to “technology” here, a very specific type of blue light with a wavelength of about 405nm. This high-energy visible (HEV) light has been shown in many studies to “inactivate” (read: kill) a range of bacteria including Salmonella, e coli, And methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (Aka MRSA) in laboratory-based studies.

Other experiments have used it in real-world situations such as hospitals. Beyond three studies Done between 2010 and 2013, researchers found that illumination reduced the number of bacteria on frequently touched surfaces in the hospital’s burn unit. The shortage varied a lot – between 27 and 90 percent – even within these individual studies, depending on factors such as how long the light was used, and how much activity was in that room Where it was used.

Lifx Clean incorporates this technology into the home lightbulbs through an array of eight 405nm LED lights that sit alongside the standard red, green, and blue diodes you find in other Lifx bulbs. A specific diffuser is then placed in the array, which means that it is almost identical to a standard lifter bulb.

It is benign in appearance – very different from another light-cleaning technique that has become popular during the epidemic era: UV light. Pilot programs have used UV lights to clean subways, buses Aircraft cabin, And Transport for London has rolled it out. Disinfected escalator handrails.

UV is fast acting, but it is incredibly dangerous when used incorrectly. According to Jim Malle, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of New Hampshire, who has been studying the use of UV and other light as a disinfectant for 30 years. There may be erythema, reddening of the skin that is most commonly associated with sunburn, and repeated exposure is also tied to skin cancer, he says. Light is especially harmful to your eye’s cornea, and coming into contact with it gives you “the worst headache you ever imagined”. Although your cornea can usually overcome exposure to UV, the melee tells me, repeated damage “tends to tie to early blindness.”

In comparison, HEV lighting does not have the same problems. “Blue light, 405 nm, is not that kind of energy,” Malley explains.

The HEV light comes with its own disadvantages. Most notably, the effect of light on bacteria has not only been studied as much as UV. Most of the research that has been done has mainly focused on the ability to kill bacteria, and there is little evidence that it is effective against the virus. COVID-19 is a very important warning due to the coronovirus SARS-CoV-2 – a virus.

Lifx is not ashamed to indicate this. In its announcement for LifeX Clean last August, the company explicitly stated that “there are currently no claims being made that the product is effective in any type of antiviral capability, including SARS-CoV-2.”

“I really want to be empowered that we are not trying to sell it as a ‘coronavirus killer’.”

But Lifex still thinks that a disinfectant lightbulb, even if it is antibacterial rather than antiviral, may help in the era of a global viral epidemic. Bacterial infection can, after all, cause serious complications for anyone sick with the virus.

HEV lights are not particularly fast when they are being used to kill bacteria. A study from 2009 Found that it took as much as 60 and 90 minutes for 405 nm light to inactivate almost all bacteria on the test, despite the fact that the light was deployed a grand total of 2cm away from it. Hospital studies have focused on using light Continuously during daylight hours To reduce your desired bacteria from anywhere between eight to 14 hours or more. In comparison, UV light can kill many bacteria and viruses in seconds.

These shortcomings mean that HEV lights have not really caught on as a disinfection technique, despite research support, Malle told me.

“It is not competitive, it is not practical. You can’t just have hours and hours of contact time, ”says Malle. In a world where a UV light can sanctify a phone in 60 seconds, the 405nm light “can’t compete.”

Lifax provided a report To The Reporter Door E. Its tests of light against coli and MRSA reveal how its light performed over multiple distances ranging from two to 12 hours. Whereas Lifx Clean is more than 80 percent e in two hours under the right conditions. Coli can kill bacteria on a glass surface, you have to run Lifx’s clean bulb for eight hours to get the same kill rate for MRSA.

The length of time involved in killing the bacteria is a downside, but McLauchon argues that the scheduling features of the smart bulb mean that it can happen automatically when you have it. “You can literally take your light at midnight, when everyone is in bed and stay in disinfectant mode until 6 in the morning and provide a disinfectant effect in that room or that surface,” McLachulen says.

The efficacy of light also distances it from the given surface. The above results were obtained from receiving the bulb just 40 cm away from the bacteria, which puts it approximately at the height of the desk lamp. Take the bulb away, and it usually takes longer to kill the same amount of bacteria. Even after eight hours, Lifex’s tests show that only four feet away, or e. About half of MRSA bacteria were killed on more than 65 percent of the coli’s surface.

These results mean that you are unlikely to see much effect if you expect to use Lifex Clean as an overhead light. Instead, the company sees people using bulbs in fixtures above desks and other surfaces. To its credit, LifeX is moving about these limits, and these are the test results Publicly available on their website For all to see. If you plan to choose one of the bulbs, it is worth reading to understand where and for how long, you will need to release the bulb to get an effect.

But there are other drawbacks with using HEV lighting that it is unlikely to be able to overcome any amount of smart scheduling or clever placement. For example, LifeX Initially said Lifax Clean will be able to disinfect the air around the bulb. However, the slow disinfection time makes it a very difficult feat to pull off, Malle explains, because of how the air particles move around.

“They are not going to be able to keep blue light on that particle of air for long” says Malle. If the bacteria gets really close to the blue light, you might see a shortage, he speculates, “But in general, I don’t think it can compete because you can just let the air near that kill zone Can not keep for long. ”

There are all kinds of variations in people’s homes that can affect how the bulb kills bacteria. Disinfecting light is, by its nature, a line-of-vision technique, so no areas of shade will be disinfected, and any lampshade along the way will also reduce its effectiveness. One of the following Hospital studies since 2013 It was found that light killed an average of 15 percent less bacteria on the side of a room that was indirectly lit compared to areas under ceiling lights. It also cannot penetrate deeply into porous surfaces, MacLaughlan admits.

The amount of variance in the average household may mean that LifeX’s citations from its lab tests will not match the real world. For reference, all of the test results cited above contained bacteria sitting on a glass slide. This may work for non-homogenous surfaces such as kitchen or bathroom countertops, but Malle warns that such an average could try to generalize too much from home laboratory results to be “pretty unrealistic”.

Such variations between laboratory results and how people actually use products in the home are nothing new, John Koeia, a clinical microbiologist and professor of clinical microbiology at the University of Southern Denmark it is said. COIA has co-authored several real-world studies that can reduce the amount of HEV light bacteria when used in hospital settings. He explains that even when it comes to traditional chemical disinfectants, many people may not already be using the right concentrations.

“You can argue about whether people are using the right concentration [of HEV light], But do people use the right amount of disinfectant? The answer is that they probably are not, ”says Coia. “In many cases, they probably use concentrations that are actually sub-lethal.”

Talked to all of us, as well as Lifx agreed that Lifx Clean is not going to change any normal cleaning. But used correctly, it can be an additional tool in your cleaning arsenal. “I want see it [HEV light] As an alternative to cleaning, but as an accessory, ”says Koya.

Several studies have shown that under the right conditions, heavy lights such as LifeX Clean can definitely kill bacteria. But even Lifex’s own laboratory tests have revealed limitations of the technology. It needs enough time, it needs to be far from the right distance, and the bacteria need a direct line to kill it. Lifx’s “Disinfectant Smart Light” is not a snake oil, but neither is it a silver bullet that will save you from your weekly cleaning chores.