From all indications, the 21st Century will be the century of light. New applications of light used in communication, chemistry, physics and medicine are already impacting our lives. Increasing numbers of science and technology articles contain reference to light. The surface of light’s use has barely been scratched. A recent invention, for example, will allow scientists to flash light at one ten-millionth of a millionth of a second, fast enough to stop the action of an electron being knocked out of orbit, or to examine the shape of a light wave. Yet as nature's secrets unravel, the mysteries of our existence increase. Ideas rejected in the past by hard sciences as beyond possibility are now attracting serious consideration in clinics and laboratories around the world. Color healing, psychic communication, and the energy bodies that surround life seem less fantasy and more reality as the quantum sciences move from theoretical conjecture to scientific understanding.

Yet biological sciences continue to be dominated by 19th Century chemical concepts as researchers and practitioners of the allopathic model still calculate body energy in chemical terms. This review explores electrical aspects of syntonics.

SPITLER: THE LEAK IN POTENTIAL

Throughout the syntonic literature one reads that blue light increases the leak in potential (electrical charge) and red decreases it. After decades of wondering just what this means, I looked in The Syntonic Principle, Chapter X, Body Potential, Brain Waves and Action Currents. Here Spitler describes how electric voltage develops across a semi-permeable membrane separating two dissimilar solutions of salt. Living cells actually generate charge across their membranes. A cell's nucleus is positively charged compared to its surrounding cytoplasm and a cell's exterior is positive compared to its interior. This potential is generated by metabolic activities within the cell and nucleus. The greater the metabolic rate the stronger the charge. If a cell is stimulated by external sources, the charge increases. If a cell is starved or has compromised membranes, its charge drops. This weakens the vitality of the cell. When the charge falls to zero, the cell dies. In healthy animals, according to Spitler, similar voltages exist between the brain, organs and other body parts. The brain, like the cell nucleus, is positively charged compared with the rest of the body. He found the greatest polarity between the liver and the brain and described how a rabbit appeared to die when he reversed the normal brain/liver polarity by inserting electrodes into its brain and liver. The rabbit's breathing and heartbeat ceased and medical examiners pronounced it dead. When Spitler reversed the electrodes to restore the normal liver-brain polarity, the rabbit suddenly regained consciousness, had normal vital signs, and appeared fully alive.

These cellular and mass body voltages must respond to and predict changes in the external environment and to internal drives such as the four F's -- fight, flight, food and reproductive drives. The senses, stimulated by light, sound and chemical signals, are the primary controllers of adaptive variations in the body's oxidation (metabolic) rate. Thus, according to Spitler, the stimulation of light on the retina directly influences general metabolic processes.

Spitler describes a simple photo-electric circuit diagram to demonstrate how ocular light therapy might alter biological energies. The circuit includes a battery, photocell, and charge-sensitive on-off switch. The photocell responds to light by sending charge to the switch. This turns the switch to its on position, thereby closing the circuit, discharging the switch, turning it off and breaking the circuit. The switch then recharges, turns on, and the process repeats itself as long as the battery stays charged and the photocell receives light. In stronger light the switch charges faster and increases the frequency of on-off cycles. Thus the frequency of discharges measures the intensity of the photocell response just as in animals stronger signals increase the frequency but not the amplitude of action potential spikes flowing along nerves. In the photocell circuit, each discharge taps the battery a little. The stronger the light stimulus, the faster the frequency of discharges, and the sooner the battery drains. In darkness there is no response, no leak, and the battery stays charged. Dim and red light produce a weak photocell response and very slow frequency of discharges and slight battery drain. Green light increases the frequency slightly but blue-violet light, the strongest stimulus, quadruples the frequency of discharge causing rapid drain on the battery.

Spitler proposes a similar circuit in animals. He demonstrates this parallel in a diagram showing a retinal photoreceptor, the sub-retinal choroid, optic nerve, brain, vagus nerve, liver, and blood stream. The photoreceptor and brain are positively charged and the choroid and liver are negative. The brain and liver have the greatest polarity and, according to Spitler, compose the animal's 'battery.' If the brain-liver polarity runs down, the animal weakens and at zero charge, the animal dies.

In this model, centrifugal nerve fibers from the brain via the optic nerve stimulate a positive retinal charge relative to the electrolytes circulating in the blood plasma of the choroid. When short-wavelength light enters the eye, it passes through the retina into choroid to ionize these electrolytes. The negatively ionized electrolytes are attracted toward and move into the positively charged retina thereby neutralizing the retina/choroid polarity. Because of the retina’s connection to the brain and the choroid’s to the liver via the blood stream, this leak diminishes the brain/liver polarity and hence the vitality of the organism.

Stimulating the eye with red light does not ionize the choroidal electrolytes so the charge between the brain and liver is stays strong. Red light allows the vital charge in the body to build while blue light depletes it. Thus, red light decreases the leak in potential and blue light increases it.

Spitler cites an experiment to confirm this hypothesis. He inserted a galvanometer between the brain and the liver of a rabbit to measure the voltage changes in response to red and blue light. When he flooded the eye with red light he recorded an increase voltage over time. Blue light produced the opposite result. The brain/liver charge drained faster than the body could replenish it.

In syntonic phototherapy, red light is prescribed for amblyopia because red allows retinal charge to build. Then when the retina fires in response to light, it does so with an increased vigor capable of overwhelming resistant synapses in the retina and visual centers in the brain. Blue light depletes excess charge in the body. When a body builds too much charge, muscles will tighten in spastic knots and senses will be hyper reactive. Increased pain, for example, would result from lowered thresholds and increased sensation. By reducing charge, blue light relieves acute pain and tension.

This conception of the healing effects of red and blue light is in line with color therapy advocates who had written this decades before Spitler.

WORK BY LIGHT THERAPISTS PRECEDING SPITLER

SETH PANCOST, M.D.

Seth Pancost, in his book: Red and Blue Light: or, Light and Its Rays as Medicine (Philadelphia, J. M. Stoddart & Co. 1877) wrote that: ". . . These two rays produce the two opposite forces, or principles of light -- the Red the positive, polarizing, integrating force or principle, the Blue the negative, depolarizing, disintegrating force or principle. . . . Relaxation of the nervous system means the relaxation of its tension, or the depolarization, disintegration of the centers or conductors of vital force . ... Excessively accelerated tension means the excessive polarization, integration of the centers or conductors of vital force. So to counteract the former we employ the positive ray (red) and to relieve the latter we employ the negative ray (blue)."

And "…to accelerate the nervous system, in all cases of relaxation, the Red ray must be used, and to relax the nervous system in all cases of excessively accelerated tension, the Blue ray must be used.

But Pancost advised " . . In light as in medicine there can be no invariable standard for doses determine alone by the symptoms; in each case, the physician must take into account the tone of body, the normal tension of the individual nervous systems and the entire temperament of the patient in health . . . A proper dose for one often proves insufficient for a second and an overdose for a third, even where the symptoms are identical. "

He used blue to relax specific areas of the body for such conditions as sub-acute rheumatism, sciatica, and stiffness in shoulder, tingling in fingers, moving pains in the back. Red light was used starting in small doses and increasing for physical and mental strain leading to exhaustion (pains in back of the head, shortness of breath, fluttering of heart, compressible pulse, loss of appetite, constipation and phosphoric urine).

EDWIN BABBITT, M.D.

In The Principles of Light and Color (1878) (see The Principles of Light and Color: The Healing Power of Color, edited by Faber Birren, University Books, New Hyde Park, NY 1967) Edwin Babbitt recommended blue for: All nervous and excitable conditions, fevers, inflammations and hemorrhages; all conditions with a surplus of the red element; diarrhea and visceral excitement; nausea, pleurisy, palpitation; excessive menstruation; points of acute pain, or too great heat; neuralgia, headache, spinal irritation. He recommended red for: all cold, dormant and chronic conditions; all anemic or impoverished states of the blood; all pale, sallow complexions with poor arterial blood; constipation of the bowels; suppressed menstruation; dormant liver, kidneys and lower spine; all hard, chronic tumors and negative inflammations; bronchitis, ulceration of lungs, paralysis, chromic rheumatism, chills; despondency, stupid brain, dropsy, exhaustion, etc.

WILLIAM HENNING, N.D., O.D.

William Henning in his book, The Practice of Modern Optometry (Actino Laboratories, Inc. Chicago, 1939) , described two fundamental responses: contraction and expansion. Although all frequencies are stimuli, application of the blue-indigo-violet frequencies induce expansion; disinhibition; dilation; relaxation; decreased secretions; increased absorption; pleasure, relief, etc. Red-yellow-orange frequencies elicit contraction; stimulation; constriction; tension; spasm; increased secretions; increased metabolism; decreased absorption; and increased pain and discomfort.

CARL LOEB, M.D.

In his A Course in Specific Light Therapy (Actino Laboratories, Inc. Chicago, [1939]), Carl Loeb described the use of filter #1 (flame-red) as a "liver and renal energizer and sensory stimulant. Red typifies the basic principle of life. It stands for blood, heat, and expansion." He rarely used red alone but in combination with yellow or orange. He called attention to initial reactions of "buoying action and mental exhilaration but excess exposure lead to negative responses of irritation and depression and a form of pent-up pressure which accumulates and may be set off explosively in the form of violent tantrum, and contrariness.

In Loeb's system he makes distinction between #4 (etheric-blue with no red frequencies) and #5 (blue-violet includes blue frequencies) (Spitler does this too with  = #4 and  = #5.) Loeb calls them 'velocities' and the #4 velocity for drying (as in runny noses), cooling (as in fevers and burns), calming (as in nervousness), pain reduction (as in headache), anti-inflammation (as in conjunctivitis) and sedation (as in insomnia). Loeb points out the difference between #4 as sedative and cooling to the blood and #5 as sedative to the nerves. So #5 would be used to slow all the body's responses, also as a mental and emotional relaxant as well as a motor depressant.

"#5 is one of the most important frequencies in the treatment of 'Americanitis' expressed in hyperirritability, hurrying, speed mania, the desire to do many things in a limited amount of time, and over-activity of many kinds without plan or reason. Continuous over-exposure to various stimuli of light, sound, and motion has created hyper-irritability of nervous response in inhabitants of our big cities, and most of those coming for treatment suffer more or less from conditions which require lowering of tonus and relaxation, where #5 is indicated." And this was in 1939!

COLONEL DINSHAW P. GHADIALI

In Dinshaw's Spectro-Chrome Metry Encyclopaedia (Spectro-Chrome Institute, Malaga, N.J., 1934, 1940), he refers to blue as "the refrigerant wave" and assigns to it the following attributes: Antipruritic, an agent that prevents or relieves itching; Diaphoretic, an agent that increases the perspiration; Febrifuge, an agent that dispels or reduces fever; Counter-irritant. an agent that allays irritation; Anodyne, an agent that soothes suffering; Demulcent, an agent that allays the irritation of abraded or scratched surfaces; and a Vitality Builder, an agent that builds the life principle. Indigo, the "semi-radio-active wave," he describes as the "opium antagonist" with the following properties: Parathyroid stimulant; Thyroid depressant; Respiratory depressant; Astringent, an agent that causes contraction and arrests discharges; Sedative, an agent that allays activity and excitement; Pain reliever, an agent that allays suffering; Hemostatic, an agent that checks the flow of blood; Inspissator, an agent that dries or thickens; and Phagocyte builder, an agent that builds cells which destroy harmful micro-organisms. He used it for excessive menstruation, for reducing tumors both cancerous and otherwise, and to stop bleeding and pain.

"The color of the liver is red; it selects from the spectrum the red wave to build itself." The attributes of red include: Sensory Stimulant, an agent that increases the activity of the sensory nervous system; Liver energizer, an agent that activates the liver; Irritant, an agent that irritates; Vesicant, an agent that blisters; Pestulant, an agent that produces or discharges puss; Rubefacient, an agent that reddens the skin; Caustic, an agent that burns or corrodes; and is a Hemoglobin builder. Although scarlet looks red (but has some added violet, as does ), Dinshaw assigns to it different attributes including: Arterial stimulant; Renal energizer; Genital excitant; Aphrodisiac; Emmenagogue, stimulates menstruation; Vasoconstrictor; Ecbolic, an agent that accelerates the expulsion of a fetus (and placenta); Sex builder in subnormal, an agent that builds the sex powers by enhancing the sensitivity.

THE CONTRIBUTION OF GEORGE W. CRILE, M.D. In addition to the influence of these earlier color therapists and authors, Spitler's ideas about the electrical charges in the cell and body were also supported by the research and writings of George W. Crile. (See The Phenomena of Life: A Radio-Electric Interpretation, W.W. Norton & Co., NY, 1936.) George Crile was a world-renowned medical researcher, inventor and pioneering surgeon who performed this country's first successful thyroidectomy operation and the first successful direct blood transfusion for humans. In medical school he became interested in why a fellow medical student died as a result of an accident that damaged his legs. The student did not suffer great loss of blood, low blood pressure or injury to the head or any organ. According to the medical knowledge at that time, the young man should not have died. This fascinated Crile. He spent the next 50 years researching the biology of life and death. He compared morphologic changes of cells and tissues from brains, livers, adrenals, and other organs before and after injury, infection, surgical trauma, insomnia, emotion, hemorrhage, asphyxia, narcotics, gland and organ excision, anaphylaxis, poisons and other causes of depression and death. "We examined all the cells of all the organs of foxes which had been pursued by hounds; of salmon before and after they had made a 1000 mile swim; of electric fish before and after discharge of their electric energy; of woodchucks in hibernation. . ." His investigation of different properties of anesthetics led to important changes in emergency medical procedures used during and since WW I.

THE BIPOLAR THEORY OF LIVING PROCESSES

According to Crile, living animals are a based more on energetic forces than material structures. (See the rainbow paragraph at the end of this article.) Life forms are distinguished from non-living material by electrical charges produced in the protoplasm. Electrical forces arrange the atoms and molecules to construct the component structures inside and outside of cells. In each of the trillions cells in the body there is created an electric strain, the vibratory discharges of which serve as the catalyst for oxidation. Oxidation in turn renews the electric charges on the countless interfaces within the cells. The structure and function of cells are both dependent upon the maintenance of the normal electrical potential. Anything that diminishes this electric charge will reduce the frequency and force of the vibratory energy released and lead to a progressive loss of vitality, fatigue, vulnerability to disease, and, if not remedied, exhaustion, unconsciousness, and finally death.

"The nucleus of the cell is comparatively acid. The cytoplasm of the cell is comparatively alkaline. The nucleus and the cytoplasm are separated by a semi-permeable membrane. Therefore the cell is a bipolar mechanism or an electric battery, the nucleus being the positive element, the cytoplasm the negative element. The rate of oxidation in the nucleus is greater than the rate of oxidation in the cytoplasm and therefore as the electric tension increases in the nucleus, the electricity passes through the nuclear membrane; the electric potential in the nucleus falls and in consequence the current is interrupted. Since the potential is again immediately restored by oxidation, radiation and other chemical activity, we conceive that an interrupted current passes continually from the positive nucleus to the negative cytoplasm. . ." George W. Crile

Crile probed living cells with tiny electrodes and discovered a voltage across the semi-permeable membrane separating the nucleus and cytoplasm. He also discovered a similar charge between parts and organs of the body and that the brain, like the nucleus of the cell, exhibits the highest charge while the liver, like the cell cytoplasm, is the least charged part of the body. He pointed out that the liver is composed of molecules similar to those found in cytoplasm and performs a similar function for the body as the cytoplasm serves for the cell. In further experiments he ran a wire between the cell's nucleus and cytoplasm causing the charge to vanish and the cell to die. If within a certain time period he removed the wire to allow the charge to rebuild, the cell came back to life. And when he neutralized the liver/brain charge by inserting wires in the liver and brain, the animal appeared to die but then came back to life after the electrodes were removed. This is similar to what Spitler described in his rabbit experiment and Spitler makes reference to Crile's research.

OXIDATION, NITROGEN AND ULTRA VIOLET LIGHT

How is this bio-electrical energy created? Crile believed that oxidation produces this charge. Oxidation is the most universal chemical reaction in nature. Oxidation is the burning of oxygen and carbon (e.g., in sugar and fat) to create CO2 and water. So basic is oxidation to life's fundamental process that the intake of oxygen and output of carbon dioxide equals the body's basal metabolic rate. Nitrogen is also important to the process. Ammonia (NH3) is a product of animal metabolism and the amount of NH3 in the blood and urine is also an accurate measure of metabolic rate.

Carbon compounds are very stable and oxidize too slowly to produce the dynamic, bioelectrical energetics required for life. Crile saw that a more explosive ingredient than carbon is required so he investigated nitrogen, which, along with carbon, is a major component of protein. Nitrogen and carbon, with oxygen, are used to make explosives such as nitroglycerin and gunpowder, a mixture of nitrate, sulfur and charcoal (carbon).

"Lightening and terrestrial electricity, which fix nitrogen, form the nitrates. The nitrates in the soil represent a pre-plant phase of living things. Solar radiance added to the nitrates generates plants. Plants generate animals. Thus solar radiation generates man. Animals, like plants, grow by virtue of solar radiation and re-radiate solar radiation. Much of the body of animals, the lungs and the circulatory system, is related to the fact that it is through oxidation in animals that the sun's radiance is re-radiated in protoplasm; that is, oxidation causes the sun to 'shine"'again in protoplasm.” George W. Crile

The nitrogen in animal cells comes from eating vegetation. Plant nitrogen comes from the soil. The nitrogen in the soil comes from the air. Air is mostly nitrogen plus a little oxygen and trace amounts of other substances. The nitrogen in air, N2 (N-N), is extremely stable and biologically inert. It must be converted, or fixed, in order to become biologically useful. This conversion happens naturally by two means -- lightning flashes or via nitrogen-fixing bacteria. This is where ultraviolet light comes into the picture. Only ultraviolet light has the power to ionize the nitrogen atoms to fracture the N-N bond. Nitrogen-fixing bacteria emit ultraviolet radiation in the process of nitrogen fixation. Lightning flashes, more than twice as hot as the 6000 Co surface temperature of the sun, radiate much more ultraviolet light. During lightning storms, ionized nitrogen combines with oxygen and water (rain) to become nitric acid, HNO3. This falls to earth to couple with potassium in the soil forming potassium nitrate (KNO3), ubiquitous in animal protoplasm and a chief ingredient of plant protein. KNO3 is also the base of the nitro-explosives. Nitro-explosives radiate intense, high-energy (ultraviolet) light, and free CO2 and N2 when detonated.

THE RADIOGEN

Just as the sun is the primary generator of energy via electromagnetic radiation for Earth, Crile postulated that billions of tiny suns in the nucleus of each cell radiate light and that this light is the source of bioelectricity. Radiogen is Crile's descriptive term to denote the theoretical units of protoplasm in which oxidation occurs and from which radiation is emitted. Each radiogen, each infinitesimal sun, is an atom of iron burning at the temperature of lightning. Powered by the oxidation of nitrogen and carbon, the radiogen radiates ultraviolet and visible light. The idea is that the portion of light from each spectral band (e.g., visible colors, infra red, ultraviolet) changes to meet the requirements of the cell and the organism as a whole. Particularly important is the radiation of ultraviolet (UV) light because only UV light has the energy to remove an electron from its existing orbit, thereby ionizing or creating charge in otherwise neutral atoms and molecules. These tiny charges accumulate in the nucleus to create the electrical potential across the membrane between the nucleus and cytoplasm. The charge builds until the membrane capacitance is exceeded. When this happens the membrane resistance breaks down and the stored energy discharges into the rest of the cell. The membrane recovers, the charge builds again, and wave after wave of energy is released to power the cell. The more UV light the radiogen radiates, the quicker the charge builds, the faster the cycle of energy release, and the greater the vitality of the cell. The mix of chemical elements present at the moment of oxidation determines the amount of UV radiated.

THE ROLE OF THE ENDOCRINE AND AUTONOMIC

A living cell's energy must match the changing needs of the organism. For example, during fight, flight or hard work, muscle cells require extra energy. Crile's research lead him to conclude that the thyroid is the governor of UV radiation and thereby controls the ongoing activity level of all cells. The thyroid concentrates iodine and secretes thyroxin, a compound containing iodine and a nitrogen fraction. Adding this to the oxygen and carbon at the radiogen brightens the fire and shifts the spectrum of radiation toward ultraviolet. Crile measured the radiation from thyroid and organ tissues oxidized with and without added thyroxin. Only the tissue high in thyroxin emitted high levels of UV light. Recall that human metabolic rate is commonly measured by thyroid function and that hyperthyroid people are energetic, mentally quick and slender while the symptoms of hypothyroidism are sluggishness, weight gain, and lack of vitality. Increased bioelectricity correlates with increase in ultraviolet.

Thyroxin also stimulates the adrenal medulla (adrenalin) and sympathetic nerve ganglions (noradrenalin). These substances increase the body's energy to prepare for and deal with emergencies. The adrenal/sympathetic hormones bring emergency powers to animals by increasing the intensity of ultraviolet radiation in the radiogens and also lend anaerobic support to sustain oxidation (after the depletion of oxygen from the blood that is supplied by the lungs). Animals that die from asphyxiation can be resuscitated by injection of adrenaline and artificial respiration. THE RADIANCE OF LIFE

Crile describes four bands of light radiation important for life. Ultraviolet light is important because it ionizes matter to create structure and growth as well as the electric energy for life. Visible light drives the sense of sight and directs movement through space in fight, flight and attraction. Long-wave infrared light maintains body heat within its critical range. And since plants use near-infrared for the photosynthesis of carbohydrates, Crile links near-infrared to insulin.

THE RAINBOW OF LIFE

The body of life is an energy form. What seems to be solid structure is in constant flux. The atoms, molecules and cells of our body are short lived, yet we look, feel and act as if nothing has changed. What remains are the fields of energy that hold and guide life's developmental process. Crile paints an image of life as a rainbow "To a child and to a primitive man, a rainbow would seem to be an object that could be felt and measured and weighed. . .Neither the energy, nor the matter that forms the rainbow, nor the energy and matter that form the living state, is constant. It is only the pattern that is constant. The entrance of each creative wavelength into the pattern of the living is the "birth" of that fraction of the living state; while the passing of that wavelength out of the pattern of the living is the 'death' of that infinitely small fraction of the living state. So, too, is the rainbow being constantly 'reborn.' So, too, is the rainbow 'dying' -- dying in quanta or wavelengths. It is only the apparition caused by the unseen velocities of wave and electric energy which our senses experience as a solid form."