Elevating Brain Performance with Light
Dr. Lew Lim
Dr. Lew Lim is the Founder & CEO of Vielight, which is a world leader in home-use, non-invasive brain stimulation based on photobiomodulation (PBM). The technology involves directing near infrared light to the brain. Vielight is currently leading clinical trials on Alzheimer’s Disease and brain injuries with PBM, among others. In his research, Dr. Lim often pushes the boundaries on what is possible with brain PBM, and is generous in sharing his discoveries. They include improving mental and sports performance and quickly achieving positive altered states in meditation. Dr. Lim is a Doctor of Natural Medicine, Engineer and Neuroscientist.
There is growing evidence showing that when we deliver near infrared (NIR) light to the brain, the brain responds in significant and positive ways. The process is identified as brain or transcranial photobiomodulation (PBM). For years, studies have concentrated on neurological and psychiatric conditions, including work by Dr. Lew Lim on dementia and Alzheimer’s Disease. However, Dr. Lim has been researching and building up evidence to demonstrate that even normal people can improve their mental performance with NIR based on a good understanding of the science. In this respect, he is recognized as one of the world’s knowledge leaders. In this presentation, he will teach the key mechanisms as well as share techniques to improve mental performance, including achieving beneficial altered meditative states.
Delivering light to your brain can lead to profound outcomes. It can literally elevate the functioning of your brain to a better performance. If you are not well, it can help you get better; it can actually even change your life.
Summary
- Photobiomodulation delivers red and infrared light to targeted brain areas to elevate cognitive function and overall brain performance. - Inducing high-frequency gamma waves via light stimulation helps achieve deeper meditative states, increased sensory clarity, and shifts in consciousness. - Research indicates that light therapy significantly improves the speed and accuracy of memory retrieval and enhances threat detection capabilities. - The technology is used in athletics to boost sports performance, contributing to competitive success in physical training and weightlifting. - Clinical trials validate the effectiveness of using light to treat neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson's, as well as traumatic brain injuries.
Article
Elevating Brain Performance With Light
At Biohacker Summit 2019 Helsinki, Dr. Lew Lim Presented Photobiomodulation As A Tool For Meditation, Memory, Athletic Performance, And Brain Health
On 1 November 2019 at Biohacker Summit 2019 Helsinki in Helsinki, Finland, Dr. Lew Lim took the stage with a proposition that sounded, at first glance, almost futuristic: that targeted red and infrared light delivered to the brain could sharpen cognition, deepen meditation, improve athletic performance, and potentially aid recovery in serious neurological conditions.
Dr. Lim, Founder and CEO of Vielight, framed the talk, titled *Elevating Brain Performance With Light*, around a rapidly developing field known as photobiomodulation, or PBM. His case was that light, when directed with precision in terms of wavelength, power, and pulse rate, could do far more than soothe or stimulate. It could alter function.
A Technology Aimed At The Brain’s Control Room
The premise of Dr. Lim’s presentation was deceptively simple. Deliver light to specific regions of the brain, and “interesting things can happen.” But the emphasis, throughout, was on precision. This was not light as metaphor, nor light as vague wellness promise. It was light as engineered intervention.
Targeted cortical photobiomodulation, he explained, used red and near-infrared wavelengths to modulate neurological performance. The goal was not only to improve function in unhealthy brains, but also to elevate performance in healthy ones.
That dual ambition gave the talk its unusual tension. It moved easily between enhancement and treatment, between the biohacker’s pursuit of peak performance and the clinician’s search for relief in Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s, and traumatic brain injury.
Chasing Gamma Waves And Altered States
One of the most striking sections of the presentation focused on meditation and high-frequency brain activity. Dr. Lim pointed to evidence that long-term meditators often exhibit elevated gamma wave activity, sometimes ranging from 40 to 200 hertz, not merely during practice but at rest.
His question was blunt and provocative: what if that gamma activity could be induced?
According to Dr. Lim, conventional neurofeedback had struggled to work effectively with gamma because the signal was difficult to detect cleanly through the skull and often obscured by muscle artefacts. His proposed alternative was direct stimulation through a light-delivery device, including the V Lite helmet, designed to pulse at controlled frequencies.
He described his own early experiment in personal terms. “By delivering light to the brain, we can induce high levels of gamma activity, resulting in an immediate deepening of state, an increase in sensory clarity, joy, and a deep calm.”
It was the language of both laboratory and revelation.
The Meditators Who Reported More Than Calm
To support the idea, Dr. Lim referred to experiments with experienced meditators, including Culadasa, author of *The Mind Illuminated*, and meditation teacher Shinzen Young. Participants were exposed to varying stimulation frequencies, including 80, 120, 160, and 200 hertz.
The reports, as relayed by Dr. Lim, were not modest. Culadasa reportedly said that higher-frequency stimulation made advanced meditative states more easily accessible. Shinzen Young, Dr. Lim said, described increased “vibratory flow”, deep calm, a no-thought state, and more energy upon waking.
For Dr. Lim, these accounts hinted at a larger scientific frontier. “We are beginning to understand what happens to long-term meditators using light, and I think it is going to change a lot of things in our fundamental understanding of meditation.”
It was a claim that reached beyond wellness culture and into the contested terrain of consciousness research.
Memory, Learning, And The Faster Mind
Yet the talk was not reserved for seasoned meditators. Dr. Lim turned quickly to what he called “normal people”, those interested less in transcendence than in cognition, learning, and sharper everyday function.
He cited research from the University of Texas at Austin suggesting that photobiomodulation could improve both the speed and accuracy of memory retrieval compared with sham treatment. “Using photobiomodulation to deliver red and infrared light helps the brain retrieve memory much more quickly and accurately than ever before,” he said.
This was one of the presentation’s central promises: not simply healing, but acceleration. A brain that recalled faster. A mind that performed with greater precision. A cognitive edge, measurable rather than mystical.
From Threat Detection To The Weight Room
Dr. Lim also pointed to military research exploring threat detection and response, saying that light therapy had produced a strong effect size of 1.4 compared with sham treatment. In a world where milliseconds can matter, the implication was clear: photobiomodulation might influence not just reflection and memory, but reaction.
From there, he moved to sport. He described the use of Vielight devices in athletic training and cited an example of a California weightlifting champion who had used the technology as part of preparation.
“Whether you are looking at meditation, cognition, learning, or sports performance, delivering light to the brain can have a profound effect on how you are able to function,” Dr. Lim said.
The sentence captured the broad ambition of the field. PBM was not being presented as a narrow medical tool. It was being cast as a platform technology for human performance.
The Clinical Hope Behind The Performance Pitch
If the first half of the talk leaned toward enhancement, the latter half returned to illness and recovery. Dr. Lim discussed the use of light-based devices in cases involving Parkinson’s symptoms and cognitive decline, including a testimonial from a user who described a profound improvement after a period of severe mental fog and despair.
The testimony was deeply personal and, in the context of the presentation, emotionally charged. “It is of the utmost importance for people to know how others have recovered using infrared light to accomplish what other treatments could not,” Dr. Lim said, underscoring the sense of urgency he attached to these stories.
Still, he acknowledged the need for validation beyond anecdote. That, he argued, was why clinical trials mattered.
Alzheimer’s, Brain Injury, And The Search For Proof
Dr. Lim noted that Vielight was involved in ongoing FDA-reviewed clinical trials, including a major Alzheimer’s disease study across multiple sites, as well as work on traumatic brain injury and plans for further research. These trials, he suggested, were essential to testing whether the promise of photobiomodulation could withstand the demands of formal medicine.
That mattered because the stakes, by the end of the talk, had become unmistakably high. This was no longer a conversation about calm, clarity, or better gym performance. It was about whether light could help restore damaged cognition and function where conventional interventions had fallen short.
A Beam Of Promise, And A Need For Evidence
At Biohacker Summit 2019 Helsinki, Dr. Lew Lim offered a vision of the brain as something both delicate and trainable, vulnerable yet open to intervention by means as seemingly gentle as light. His presentation drew a line from meditation research to neurodegenerative disease, from memory retrieval to threat detection, from altered states to clinical trials.
It was an arresting message, shaped by the optimism that often surrounds emerging neurotechnology. But it was also grounded, at least in part, in an appeal for evidence: more trials, more data, more scrutiny.
In that sense, *Elevating Brain Performance With Light* stood at the intersection of hope and proof. The promise was expansive. The science, Dr. Lim suggested, was still catching up.
Part of Biohacker Summit 2019 Helsinki