The Calculated Circadian Effects of Light Exposure from Commuting

Abstract

Light entrains human circadian rhythms, but increased time spent indoors and decreased daylight exposure may disrupt human circadian regulation and cause health problems. Much research is focused on improving indoor lighting conditions to minimize the adverse circadian impact of electric lights, and few studies investigate the circadian impact of daylight during the incidental time that people spend outdoors. For instance, when people commute from home to work, they are exposed to daylight. The purpose of this study is to investigate daylight’s impact on commuters’ circadian rhythms. Measurements of the illuminance and the spectral irradiance distribution (SID) of daylight were taken for three modes of commuting: driving, riding on trains, and walking; and under different weather conditions, on different days, and at different locations throughout the summer and autumn in the Sydney metropolitan region in Australia. With the SID data, three metrics were calculated to estimate the circadian impacts: α-opic irradiance, circadian stimulus (CS), and equivalent melanopic lux (EML). The results suggest that driving or walking on sunny or cloudy days and riding trains on sunny days are beneficial for the commuters’ circadian synchronization.