To keep your body in tune this master clock resets itself each day with the help of environmental cues. Absent any cues, the clock may drift to a period that is longer than 24 hours. The main cue that keeps everything synced is the daily pattern of sunlight and darkness, generated by the Earth's rotation.

It turns out that both brightness and color — amplitude and wavelength — at appropriate times of day are important in keeping the circadian rhythm in check. Among other things, light⁄dark cycles influence the production of melatonin, an important chemical in the circadian control system.

conditions, such as insomnia and lack of energy, when desynchronized. These conditions are normally remedied with various chemical stimulants and depressants, many of which have undesirable side effects.

Mimicing the Cycle

Luckily, there is a potential alternative solution. The ability to adjust the color and intensity of the LIFX bulb means you may be able to promote improved rhythm regulation indoors, without the help of chemicals. The dLUX team has provided us with a rough schedule of sunlight throughout the day. On a clear day, the light outside progresses from a low, orange–tinted hue in the morning to an intense, bright white around noon, and back to a dim orange in the evening. Periods of darkness are replaced by reddish–orange light, which enables sight but has little to no effect on the production of melatonin.

Using this schedule as a guide, you can use the LIFX bulb and app together to mimic natural patterns of daylight and darkness: When you wake up, set the bulb to an orange hue from the colors menu, with a brightness of about 65%. In the mid–morning, switch to the whites menu to select a medium–white hue. Turn up the brightness to about 80%. Around mid–day, ramp up to 100% brightness and a bluish–white tint. In the mid–afternoon, turn it back down to a warm white with about 75% brightness. At dinner time, switch back to the colors menu and set the bulb to a pleasant yellow–orange hue at around 55% brightness. When you're getting ready for bed, ramp down to a reddish–orange hue and 30% brightness or less.

With this knowledge in hand, the LIFX bulb becomes a powerful tool in potentially promoting health and circadian rhythm regulation. Note that the suggestions in this post are only guidelines. You may need to adjust intensity and color settings to better fit your environment and individual preferences.

As multicolor LEDs go, the LIFX is probably the best–looking one that I've seen, and certainly the brightest. With dozens of diodes and 1,000 lumens to its name, it's a muscular bulb, capable of producing bright, vivid light of any color you want. Like the Philips Hue LED, it offers both a full color spectrum and a natural light spectrum, but by allowing you to combine the two simply by dialing a color's brightness up from 50 to 100 percent, it essentially offers you a third spectrum of tinted white light to play with — and that makes a lot of sense for more practical household lighting scenarios.

Among color–changing smart bulbs, the LIFX Color 1000 is the brightest and the most efficient. Its colors hit the mark across the spectrum. Its app is the most fully–featured and easy to use. It boasts a number of useful third party integrations with popular products and services — enough to put this bulb on the same level as the very well connected Philips Hue LEDs. It won't work with Apple HomeKit (or with Siri) the way that Philips Hue bulbs will, but integrations with Alexa and Cortana help close the gap.

As multicolor LEDs go, the LIFX is probably the best–looking one that I've seen, and certainly the brightest. With dozens of diodes and 1,000 lumens to its name, it's a muscular bulb, capable of producing bright, vivid light of any color you want. Like the Philips Hue LED, it offers both a full color spectrum and a natural light spectrum, but by allowing you to combine the two simply by dialing a color's brightness up from 50 to 100 percent, it essentially offers you a third spectrum of tinted white light to play with — and that makes a lot of sense for more practical household lighting scenarios.