The image shows a dirty collector versus a clean collector. The dirty collector comes from a LightAir IonFlow 50 Sky installed in a public school in the city center of Stockholm, Sweden.

RELEVANT WORLD HEALTH SITUATION

In conjunction with the European Respiratory Society Congress (ERS) in Stockholm in 2007 WHO published a report stating that one billion of the world’s inhabitants now have chronic lung diseases and that by 2020, these will be the world’s greatest cause of death. This applies to pulmonary infections such as tuberculosis as well as lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), plus a range of respiratory diseases such as asthma and diseases involving defective breathing regulation, like sleep apnea and sudden infant death. Whilst the incidence of many other major disease groups is declining, lung diseases are on the increase. (Source: DN)

IT IS ALL ABOUT SMALL PARTICLES

Small particles, below the size of 2.5 micron (PM2.5) and even more below 1 micron, are inhaled more or less deeply into our lungs and enter our blood stream bringing also other substances into our body. Today this is considered to be a major cause of heart and vascular diseases as well as different forms of cancer. 
 

A number of different lung problems are caused by the same small size particles. During the last couple of years it has been proven that allergic and asthma reactions have become 10 -100 times more aggressive in combination with breathing such small soot particles, mostly from combustion of fossil fuels, which are the great majority of particles in the air today (see enclosed report). And it does not have to be simultaneous. 
 

Fine, ultrafine and nano particles cause almost all the health problems from particles in the air according to scientific evidence during the last years. Not even the allergy organisations seem to be fully aware of this yet. E.g. they still consider pollen and mould spores to be major causes which is both true and false. Air cleaning of pollen is like trying to suck in basket balls into a vacuum cleaner. Pollen are huge particles but they contain allergens which come lose when pollen break apart and become ultrafine particles mostly containing allergens, i.e. proteins/albumins.
 

Health problems caused by mould are most probably not caused by rather large sized mould spores. It has been proven over the last 4-5 years that different kinds of mould continuously generate large quantities of ultrafine particles containing mycotoxins which are among the most potent poisons in nature. This is the major cause of mould sickness. 
 

Thus, the smallest particles, which are everywhere in enormous numbers and which are “floating” for very long periods of time in the air, are proven to cause most of the different health problems and even more so in combination with different allergens. Reducing the concentration of such small particles in the air has a positive effect on our health. This can be accomplished by using high performance air purifiers provided however that they are in continuous operation as air quality is extremely volatile.

(Sources: GSF, EPA, CEPA, American Lung Association, American Heart Association, Science Daily)

RELEVANT TEST STANDARDS OF AIR PURIFIERS

Changes in scientific approach
By testing indoor air pollution or air purification performance it has always been considered significant to count particles of different sizes and obviously it remains the most important aspect, but it was also considered to be interesting to calculate the accumulated mass of particles in the air.

Since some time the entire scientific interest is today concentrated on the accumulated surface of particles in the air which is quite well correlated to the number of particles.

As normally approx. 99% of all particles in indoor air are below the size of 0.3 micron having almost no mass, one can start understanding the enormous impact of this change in scientific approach. And accumulated mass has become quite irrelevant.

Generation of particles
Most testing procedures and standards use particles which are more or less artificially generated making it possible to repeat the procedure properly. Such particles are often generated by different chemicals turned into aerosols, by using cigarette smoke or diesel exhaust, or by burning candles. The main objective is to generate a specific size distribution of particles that approximates the average size distribution in indoor air.

The substance of these particles is less important. It is all about size. Cigarette smoke supposedly contains some 3000 different substances and there are probably millions of different substances in indoor air.

The disadvantage with using chemicals is that such particles are sometimes quite unrealistic and can actually be quite different from the real normal particles in indoor air and some aspects of such particles are not sufficiently documented, like density, but they can be consistently repeated which makes testing easier but less realistic.

Some such particles according to certain test standards are called pollen, dust and smoke by abuse of language. Generation of particles by burning candles or similar is considerably more realistic as it produces carbon based soot particles from combustion of fossil fuels, which in general constitute the majority of pollution particles in the air (from cars, trucks, trains, ships, working machines, airplanes, power plants, heat plants, heating installations etc.). And its size distribution is also realistic and rather controllable.

Counting particles of different sizes 
All different testing procedures are made for testing the efficiency of reducing the concentration of particles of different sizes in the air, meaning all particles of any kind incl. living particles like viruses, bacteria, allergens, fungi, mould etc.

Particles which are hazardous to our health are below the size of 2.5 micron and even more so below the size of 1 micron and approx. 99% of these particles in indoor air are in fact below the size of 0.3 micron. Consequently we should concentrate all efforts of testing the performance of air purifiers to these particle sizes.
Larger particles are quite well handled by our body defence systems and can be taken care of by vacuum cleaners and air cleaners, meaning machines with fan driven artificial airflow.

Testing conditions and instruments
The air purifier to be tested should be placed in the middle of the test chamber and approx. one meter above floor level. A very slow fan should be installed in a corner of the test chamber in order to simulate realistic air movement in a room, otherwise caused by heating, ventilation, opening and closing of doors, people moving around and their activities.

For serious testing it is necessary to use particle counting instruments which are able to separate sizes in at least ten intervals from approx. 0.007 to 2.5 micron. Such equipment is quite expensive and therefore not frequently found at third party test sites.

Relevant, valid and reliable tests & results
Some of the above facts have not yet filtered through to allergy organizations or test institutions and test standards have not been modified accordingly. Testing standards in general are not concentrated where they should be, namely on the fine, ultrafine and nano particles. Certain aspects of existing standards are actually also to a certain extent open to manipulation of results e.g. CADR. And unfortunately the business is full of bad testing procedures, lack of methodology and false “truths” and “scientific” reports.

LIGHTAIR IONFLOW TECHNOLOGY

The IonFlow technology is an innovation with new advanced negative ionization developed to continuously and effectively reduce the concentration of the smallest particles (fine, ultra fine and nano) in the air which according to scientific consensus is a major cause of severe health problems and premature death. It does this with no ozone, no filter to replace at an extreme low energy consumption and is completely silent.

Please find test reports for download to the right.

LIGHTAIR PHILOSOPHY

Third party test results shall have a sufficient level of quality and objectivity to satisfy someone in charge of hygiene in hospitals and clinics or be relevant to the scientific community in general. Consequently all test reports must be openly published, like any regular scientific paper, in order to be considered valid and reliable. Otherwise we do not have anything to say. And we will do our utmost to stick to this concept. 

Negative ions - Proven positive effects

French physicist J Bricard discovered the relation between the electric state of the air and its micro pollution as early as the 50's. The physical law of Bricard is simple: Low concentration of negative ions in the air equals pollution. High concentration of negative ions equals healthy air. Besides the air cleaning capacity of the LightAir purifier, it creates an environment with very high quantities of negative ions in the room. There has been extensive research conducted in many fields of general effects of negative ions. The results show a number of positive effects on overall health.

Economic & Environmental - No filters to change

Instead of a filter, LightAir uses an aluminum collector to trap the pollution in the air. This means that you don't have to buy and change expensive filters every year. An average well working filter kit will cost you from $400-500 per year. With LightAir, all you have to do is to wash the collector with hot water and washing-up liquid when needed. The need for filter change will most likely affect your air quality negatively. Surveys show that only 16% of owners of filter based air purifiers change filters according to manufacturers recommendations. Either because they forget to change, finds it time consuming or belive it is too expensive.

Economic & Environmental - Low consumption of electricity

Lightair will save you a lot of money on electricity. Since a filter based purifier need a fan to move the air around, the energy consumption is high - between 40 and 210 watt per hour depending on size, effect level and brand. The LightAir on the other hand only needs 7W per hour in full effect, just 10% of a normal light bulb!