Well-known for his homemade telescope and observatory, Dr. Motta’s reports on outdoor lighting have led to a revolution in the lighting industry. In this presentation, Dr. Motta will show the many ways excess nighttime lighting, especially overly blue lighting causes a number of detrimental human health effects as well as damage to the environment.  

There are strong economic and climate-related arguments for the use of LEDs in street lighting around the world, but not all LED light is optimal. Some LED lighting produces excess blue emission, harmful to both human health and the environment.  The problem with blue light at night is that it suppresses production of melatonin, an important hormone that controls our natural circadian rhythms. Melatonin has also been shown to play an important role in the human immune system, and suppressing it has detrimental human health effects. Many white LED street lights have a spectrum that contains a strong spike in the blue wavelength, which is most effective at suppressing melatonin during the night. There is now voluminous data showing a higher risk of hormonally linked cancers with melatonin suppression.

Also, improperly designed lighting fixtures result in disability glare, and create road hazard conditions, with implications for night-time driving visibility. This can be significantly mitigated by proper design, shielding and proper installation. The visual hazard posed by these very intense point sources is magnified by higher color temperature LEDs because blue light scatters more in the human eye. 

Dr. Motta will discuss reports from the AMA and the UN councils he was on that advise how to properly light the nighttime without these ill effects.

About Dr. Mario Motta, MD, FACC

Dr. Mario Motta has been active in organized medicine and the AMA since medical school at Tufts University. A member of the AMA House of Delegates since 2003, Mario served eight years on the AMA Council on Science and Public Health (CSAPH), and was vice chair of the Massachusetts AMA delegation. Dr. Motta was president of the Massachusetts Medical Society (MMS) in 2009-10 and served on the Board of Trustees of the AMA from 2018 to 2022.He dealt with myriad issues regarding the health care delivery system, health insurance, scope of practice, young physician engagement, and burnout. 

As chair of the MMS Committee on Legislation, he was intimately involved with Massachusetts health care reform, resulting in the state having the lowest rate of uninsured residents in the United States. His reports on outdoor lighting have led to a revolution in the lighting industry. The AMA continues to receive great praise for this effort, with many cities specifically citing the AMA report in choosing their outdoor lighting as being “AMA compliant.” He is board-certified in cardiology and nuclear cardiology, was director of cardiology research for his practice, and is a clinical professor of medicine at Tufts University. 

Mario is well known as an astronomer. Working with the American Association of Variable Star Observers, Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and MIT, he has numerous observations and publications to his credit. In 2013, the International Astronomical Union named an asteroid in his honor (asteroid 133537mariomotta). In the astronomical community, Dr. Motta is well known for his large and completely homemade telescope and observatory, including the optics, a 32-inch f6 telescope.