Why doesn't intense infrared radiation from a fire harm your eyes?

[DaleSwanson]

The other night I was watching a campfire and the infrared light from it was intense enough that it warmed my face quite a bit, almost uncomfortably. I must have been receiving quite a bit of invisible light in my eyes, but there was no damage (and I've never heard any warning about watching campfires being dangerous to eyes).

On the other hand, light from the Sun would not warm my skin as much as the fire did, yet looking directly at the Sun would damage my eyes. Also, I know that infrared lasers can be quite an eye hazard because your eyes don't respond to limit the light at all.

This leads me to believe the following conclusions: A. Infrared light can damage your eyes. B. The intensity of light received from a campfire can be higher than from the Sun. C. Even if there is more intense light from a campfire, it is safer than light from the Sun.

Why isn't light from a campfire a danger to your eyes?

 

[DaveC426913]

A. Infrared light can damage your eyes.
B. The intensity of light received from a campfire can be higher than from the Sun.

I don't see how you arrive at these conclusions. I don't see how they follow from any of the points you made.

But the short answer to your question is two-fold:
1] The sun is many orders of magnitude more intense than any campfire. Your eyes adjust so that the campfire seems bright, but that's entirely subjective (your pupil compensates for the low light). Try using your camera. Then you'll see the huge difference.
2] IR light is low energy compared to UV light, which is much of the damaging light that comes from the sun.

 

[DaleSwanson]

I arrive at conclusion A. (that infrared light can damage your eyes), based on the fact that infrared lasers can damage your eyes.

Conclusion B, may be confusing because I used 'light' when I should have said all electromagnetic radiation. I realize my eyes are receiving much more visible light from the Sun than from a fire. However, since the fire warms my face more than the sun, that makes me believe there is more total wattage of EM radiation hitting my face (and thus my eyes) from the fire.

 

[Bobbywhy]

Despite being inside of your eye, there are cells that normally never see light. When you go from a low light area to a bright area, your pupils are still dialated, the light entering is not focused onto the cells in the back of your eye that are designed for seeing, and light falls on these other sensitive cells causing the pain that you feel.

Of course, it depends on what wavelength of IR you are talking about. The near IR (800 nm to 1400 nm) is focused on your retina just as if it were visible light. The only difference is your retina does not have receptors that detect it. If you look at a visible light that is too powerful, you will damage your eyes. If you look at a IR light in this range that is equally powerful, you will do nearly equal damage. And you do not have pain receptors on your retina to know you are burning it. Because you don't detect it, so you won't blink or look away like you would with visible light, IR light in this range is actually more dangerous than visible light. It does not matter that the photons are less energetic, since when you talk about light power, you talk about total energy and not energy per photon.

If you look at light over 1400 nm, it will be absorbed primarily by your cornea. Since it is not focused by the lens (like the near IR is), it is much harder to get the energy density needed to damage your eye. Also, you can sense pain in your cornea, so you will know that your eye is getting burnt. And the cornea is one of the fastest regenerating tissues in your body, so damage to the cornea is not as catastrophic as damage to the retina. So, unless you are looking at a super powerful light source in this range, it's probably not a concern. They do, however, make lasers that are plenty powerful enough at these wavelengths to do damage.

In general, it is hard to find light sources in the IR that are powerful enough to do damage, in either wavelength range. Diffuse sources, like the ones used to heat things, are not going to be powerful enough. And things in consumer products (laser mice, remote controls, etc) are going to be made weak enough to not cause damage for legal reasons. But if you are talking about IR lasers or powerful night illumination systems, eye damage is certainly an issue and IR lasers cause more laser eye injuries than all other types of lasers.

 

[Drakkith]

The radiation emitted from a campfire is nowhere close to the Sun. Looking directly at the sun puts not only Infrared, but also massive amounts of visible light into your eyes, as most of the energy put out is in the visible range. A campfire puts out a very tiny fraction of its energy as visible light. Most of it is infrared. The amount of infrared light entering your eye is not enough to damage it unless you get very close to the fire, at which point I would be more worried about my face burning off.

 

[DaleSwanson]

If you look at light over 1400 nm, it will be absorbed primarily by your cornea. Since it is not focused by the lens (like the near IR is), it is much harder to get the energy density needed to damage your eye.

I think this is the answer I was looking for, thanks. So NIR is focused optically, but other wavelengths aren't. Thus it doesn't matter that there is much more total EM radiation if it is in non-optical wavelengths. Campfires output mostly light in wavelengths longer than NIR (and thus non-optical).

The radiation emitted from a campfire is nowhere close to the Sun. Looking directly at the sun puts not only Infrared, but also massive amounts of visible light into your eyes, as most of the energy put out is in the visible range. A campfire puts out a very tiny fraction of its energy as visible light. Most of it is infrared. The amount of infrared light entering your eye is not enough to damage it unless you get very close to the fire, at which point I would be more worried about my face burning off.

Yes, clearly the Sun puts out more total light than a campfire. However, what matters is watts/m², and at the range I was talking about the watts/m² for all forms of EM radiation was higher for a campfire (as evidenced by the greater warming on my face from the fire). As Bobbywhy pointed out, most of those wavelengths don't get focused and thus don't damage the eye.

 

[Drakkith]

Yes, clearly the Sun puts out more total light than a campfire. However, what matters is watts/m², and at the range I was talking about the watts/m² for all forms of EM radiation was higher for a campfire (as evidenced by the greater warming on my face from the fire). As Bobbywhy pointed out, most of those wavelengths don't get focused and thus don't damage the eye.

Yes, that does seem to make more sense than my explanation!

 

[Lsos]

I am just talking based on my gut feeling here, but I would say that the infrared light doesn't damage your eyes simply because your eyes aren't sensitive to it. Your eyes are sensitive to visible light, so an excess of this will quickly damage them...much like loud audible noises will damage your hearing. So it's not so much the "wattage/m^2" from the sun that damages your eyes, but the simple fact that you are overloading them.

I'm guessing an infrared laser DOES damage your eyes based on the "wattage/m^2" mechanism, but I'll also guess that the laser's "wattage/m^2" is many orders of magnitude greater than a campfire's or even the sun's.

 

[Dale]

Prolonged exposure to IR can damage the eyes and cause "Glass blower's cataracts".
http://www.optometry.co.uk/uploads/articles/33aa07d53d20b5cbc6f17ffc81f0dc94_Voke1990521.pdf
http://www.ilo.org/safework_bookshelf/english?content&nd=857170571

 

[Ryan_m_b]

I think that IR must be very intense i.e. laser-level concentrated to cause damage to the eye. Wiki has some graphs and information detailing power levels and exposure times for various wavelengths http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laser_safety#Maximum_permissible_exposure

 

[Dickfore]

The intensity of a laser beam is much higher than both Sun's radiation and campfire. The Sun has spectral components in all wavelengths, and not just the IR.

 

[russ_watters]

I think that IR must be very intense i.e. laser-level concentrated to cause damage to the eye.

This is the key to all three examples. It isn't the total heat absorbed, it is the intensity. For example, a small campfire that shows you a 1 foot cross section from 5 feet away is 530x bigger than the sun. If it warms you as much as the sun, it is 530 times less intense, meaning an individual cell on your cornea receives 530x less light/heat.

 

[Dale]

Prolonged (occupational) exposure can cause damage at relatively low intensity. Much less intense than lasers.

 

[Andy Resnick]

<snip>
2] IR light is low energy compared to UV light, which is much of the damaging light that comes from the sun.

I think this is the essential answer.

 

[russ_watters]

No, I'm pretty sure it isn't. It's all about intensity. The OP captured his error in the title: he thinks a fire is intense, but it isn't. See:

 

[russ_watters]

Yes, clearly the Sun puts out more total light than a campfire. However, what matters is watts/m², and at the range I was talking about the watts/m² for all forms of EM radiation was higher for a campfire (as evidenced by the greater warming on my face from the fire). As Bobbywhy pointed out, most of those wavelengths don't get focused and thus don't damage the eye.

What matters in eye damage isn't the watts per sq meter hitting your body, but the watts per sq m hitting a tiny spot on the back of your retina. Because your eye focuses the light, the size - and thus intensity - of that spot is a function of the angular size of the source. So a fire can heat up your body as much as the sun while at the same time appearing 500x less intense to your eye.

 

[DaveC426913]

a tiny spot on the back of your retina. Because your eye focuses the light, the size - and thus intensity - of that spot is a function of the angular size of the source.

And - if I understand correctly - your cornea/lens does not focus IR light, so it won't appear as a spot on your retina, it will be diffuse IR on your retina.

 

[russ_watters]

It may not focus as well, but I'd be awfully surprised if it was so far out of focus as to affecect the intensity of something so large. I'll look into it though.

 

[AlexLAV]

I agree with russ_watters. Solar light is more concentrated on the retina than light of the campfire. Intensity of light within image of the light source created on the retina is proportional to brightness of the source and it doesn’t depend on the distance to the source. At the same time intensity of light on the skin or on the external surface of the eye is proportional to the brightness as well, but it also is proportional to visible spatial angle of the source. Let’s make some estimations.

Brightness (measured in W/cm^2) of a black-body light emitter is proportional to 4th order of its temperature. The Sun is good black-body light source with the temperature of about 5800 K. The flame of the campfire may be not entirely black-body emitter. In that case its brightness is some lower than brightness of an equivalent black-body source with the same temperature, but since dependence of brightness on the temperature is very sharp, and temperature range for the flame is rather wide, I neglect by non-blackness of the flame. Typical temperature of campfire flame is within 800-1400 K. So the brightness of the Sun is approximately 300-3000 times higher than brightness of the campfire. Moreover, the Sun emits most of its light within visible and NIR, while spectral maximum of the campfire is within 2-4 microns. So most of solar light propagates to retina, while most of the campfire radiation is absorbed into transparent tissues of the eye. So the intensity of solar light on the retina can be several orders of magnitude higher than intensity produced by campfire.

Concerning intensity of radiation on the skin. Visible angular diameter of the Sun is about 0.5 deg, while visible angular size of the campfire may be 30 or 60 deg or even higher. So visible spatial size of the campfire may be about 4 orders of magnitude higher than solar one. Though the Sun is 300-3000 times brightly, intensity of solar radiation on the skin may be dozens times lower.

With respect to lasers, their brightness is just huge. Even a customary green laser pointer can be 4-5 orders of magnitude brighter than the Sun. By this reason lasers are considered as dangerous light sources.

Beg pardon for my probably poor English.

 

[Andy Resnick]

No, I'm pretty sure it isn't. It's all about intensity. The OP captured his error in the title: he thinks a fire is intense, but it isn't. See:

The literature does not support your assertion. It's useful to note that the maximum solar irradiance, spectrally integrated, is approximately 100 mW/cm^2, and your aversion reflex occurs at levels well below this (around 10 mW/cm^2). Fires can exceed the intensity of the sun- the UN test 6(c) demarcates between 'minor' and 'major' hazards at 400 mW/cm^2.

Sliney and Wolbarsht, in "Safety with Laser and Other Optical Sources" present a comprehensive discussion about optical hazards from solar viewing. UV light is the most common source of ocular injury through damage to the cornea and lens, and there does not appear to be evidence that solar retinitis or cataracts are caused by thermal damage from sunlight.

Determining damage thresholds to the eye is complicated by wavelength, image size, and exposure time, but corneal damage varies from 0.01 J/cm^2 at 280 nm, rising to 100 J/cm^2 at 400 nm- no UV light reaches the retina. In the retinal hazard region (400-1400nm), thermal retinal damage threshold occurs approximately 10 times higher than retinal exposure from direct viewing of the sun. Finally, clinical accounts of retinal injury from viewing the sun during an eclipse (when the pupil dilates) can be explained by noting that the cw blue-light damage threshold (30 mW/cm^2 at 442 nm) is exceeded at mid-day (36 mW/cm^2) but not at sunrise/sunset (0.01 mW/cm^2).

 

[daveb]

You're also forgetting the fact that what you feel on your body is the result of radiation, as well as convection and conduction from the surrounding air being heated.

 

[turbo]

When I was studying for the ABO opticianry exam, I had the unfortunate "luck" of getting prepped by a woman in the practice that had no understanding of wavelength and intensity. She said in class that IR from welding caused eye-damage, and when I challenged her and said that it was the UV that caused eye-damage, she was greatly affronted.

The next week, she claimed that she was right and I was wrong, based on a conversation with the ophthalmologist that she worked for. I let it slide, although I had spoken to her employer shortly after the last class and informed him how misguided his optician was.

No matter. I aced the ABO exam with the highest score that anybody in the practice had ever earned. I knew enough about light and optics that the grunt-worker in the optical lab leaned on me. I coached him and encouraged him to take the ABO exam with me, though the senior (dispensing) opticians constantly told him that he needed years and years more experience before he could sit for certification. We both passed with flying colors, and when I showed him my letter of certification, he grabbed it and waved it under the nose of the senior optician. I had out-scored that snob by over 10 points and my lab-partner had almost tied him.

BTW, I was not a full-time optician. I was an IT specialist and troubleshooter. The senior optician had told the senior partner of the practice not to pay for us to take the exam, since I would have had only 5 months of (very) part-time experience, and Roger was "uneducated and unqualified". After that, every single optician in the practice studied, sat for the exam, and became ABO certified. A point that every advertisement made crystal-clear in the later years. Come to our practice. Our doctors are board-certified and all of our opticians are, too.

 

[turbo]

Sorry to go off the tracks there, but I can't take any of it back. IR is not harmful unless you're exposed to intense levels of it. I have incipient cataracts because when I was on ski-patrol in the '60's there were no goggles or sunglasses with UV protection. Cut down the visible light, and your pupils expand, letting in more and more UV. The UV reflected off the snow is diffuse, but very damaging.

 

[atyy]

2] IR light is low energy compared to UV light, which is much of the damaging light that comes from the sun.

I think this is the essential answer.

Why is this the case? Is it like the photoelectric effect where a minimum photon energy is needed to kick an electron out of its orbit?

In which case, how does sufficiently intense IR cause damage, since those photons would always have insufficient energy? A nonlinear effect (two-photon or other) feels unlikely?

Also, is it generically the case that the damage caused for the same intensity ranks gamma > x-ray > optical? Or is it like transparency, which is material dependent too?

 

[Andy Resnick]

Why is this the case? Is it like the photoelectric effect where a minimum photon energy is needed to kick an electron out of its orbit?

In which case, how does sufficiently intense IR cause damage, since those photons would always have insufficient energy? A nonlinear effect (two-photon or other) feels unlikely?

Also, is it generically the case that the damage caused for the same intensity ranks gamma > x-ray > optical? Or is it like transparency, which is material dependent too?

To be clear, I was discussing IR radiation from a fire (that is, a cw extended source) as opposed to an IR laser. Certainly, IR lasers can be extremely hazardous.

Perhaps the diagram here will help make sense of things:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IEC60825_MPE_W_s.png

There are a few quantities to pay attention to: the wavelength and power, but also the exposure time. CW sources are taken equivalent to 3*10^4 seconds exposure time (24 hours)- looking at the source all day, every day.

Some obvious trends- as the exposure time increases, the maximum permissive exposure (MPE) drops. Second, for cw exposure, as the wavelength decreases the MPE decreases- and note, Class I and II lasers are *only* operational in the retinal hazard spectral region (400-1400 nm).

Ocular damage mechanisms vary with wavelength: I don't know about X-rays, but the shorter the UV wavelength (say UV-C < UV-B < UV-A), the more energy is absorbed at the cornea- 100% absorption at wavelengths below 280 nm, according to my text. So UV damage is limited to the cornea (snow blindness/welder's flash) and lens (cataracts)- and clearly, the timescale for damage to occur varies as well.

Going to longer wavelengths is the retinal hazard region- this light is principally absorbed by the retina, and so damage thresholds will vary with how focused the image is- this is why class II lasers (equivalent to forcibly staring at the sun) are less than 1 or 2 mW. This damage is thought to be burning- the retinal epithelium can be heated to incandescence if a Q-switched pulse hits the unprotected eye.

Going out past 1400nm, again the light does not reach the retina but is absorbed by the cornea and aqueous humor. The dominant damage mechanism for the NIR is again cataracts (glassblower's cataracts), but the process is (AFAIK) unclear. As the wavelength increases past 2000nm, the cornea absorbs all light and burns are produced, similar to skin burns.

 

[Drakkith]

What exactly causes eye damage when staring at the Sun? Is the retina heated to a high temperature?

 

[Andy Resnick]

What exactly causes eye damage when staring at the Sun? Is the retina heated to a high temperature?

The dominant hazard is excess UV light damaging the cornea and lens.

http://www.agingeye.net/visionbasics/uvlightandvision.php
http://www.webmd.com/eye-health/corneal-flash-burns

 

[Drakkith]

The dominant hazard is excess UV light damaging the cornea and lens.

http://www.agingeye.net/visionbasics/uvlightandvision.php
http://www.webmd.com/eye-health/corneal-flash-burns

If so, then it looks like that's the answer to the OP.

 

[Lsos]

So this implies that if the sun had no UV light, we could stare directly at it? This somehow doesn't seem right. Just from experience, the natural tendency for you to not stare at the sun seems to be down to its brightness, not its UV output.

I'm not arguing, just bringing up a point (which I brought up on the previous page) that I wished someone would address.

Isn't the visible light damaging to the eyes (in the short term) simply because the eyes are sensitive to it? Just like loud noise will damage the ears...but won't affect the eyes. Likewise, no matter how bright you make the light, it won't damage the ears (within reason)?

 

[Drakkith]

I'm not sure Lsos. Unless the cells are getting killed, then I'm not sure what the problem would be.

 

[russ_watters]

I'm not sure Lsos. Unless the cells are getting killed, then I'm not sure what the problem would be.

Cells don't need to die for you to feel pain/discomfort. I have sensitive eyes and if I'm not wearing sunglasses on a bright day I feel discomfort even if I'm facing away from the sun!

 

[Drakkith]

Cells don't need to die for you to feel pain/discomfort. I have sensitive eyes and if I'm not wearing sunglasses on a bright day I feel discomfort even if I'm facing away from the sun!

Sure, but acute damage to your eyes via sunlight would only result from dead cells right?

 

[Andy Resnick]

<snip>Just from experience, the natural tendency for you to not stare at the sun seems to be down to its brightness, not its UV output.

You are referring to the aversion reflex- that is generated by light hitting the retina, and so is not generated by UV light. Nonetheless- sunlight, in the 400-1400nm spectral region, is of insufficient brightness to physically damage your retina according to experiments on rabbit retinas.

 

[Billy Rayan]

The other night I was watching a campfire and the infrared light from it was intense enough that it warmed my face quite a bit, almost uncomfortably. I must have been receiving quite a bit of invisible light in my eyes, but there was no damage (and I've never heard any warning about watching campfires being dangerous to eyes).

On the other hand, light from the Sun would not warm my skin as much as the fire did, yet looking directly at the Sun would damage my eyes. Also, I know that infrared lasers can be quite an eye hazard because your eyes don't respond to limit the light at all.

This leads me to believe the following conclusions: A. Infrared light can damage your eyes. B. The intensity of light received from a campfire can be higher than from the Sun. C. Even if there is more intense light from a campfire, it is safer than light from the Sun.

Why isn't light from a campfire a danger to your eyes?

Infrared radiations are radiations with wavelength about 1nm -3000nm, and with different divisions like Near(.75-1.4), Short(1.4-3), Mid(3-8), Long(8-15) and Far(15-1000) all values are in nm. Now if you are talking about radiations coming from sun, then first of all they are about 2500nm +, secondly radiations are of extremely high intensity, last but not the least they are coming from a source having area larger then area of earth. Further infrared radiations coming from a camp fire is not completely harm less they will harm your eyes but because they are coming from a small source in cool surroundings with less wavelength it will not look like harming instantly.

And about Infrared radiations even we release infrared radiations, then it doesn’t mean if you are looking at someone continually then your eyes will get damaged due to infrared radiations releasing by that person.