What Effect Does a Tanning Bed Have on Your Body's Isotopes?

Tanning is a common practice for many people. Looking tan is considered by many to appear "healthy," while pale people are thought of as "sickly." To correct this people often use tanning booths. Tanning will achieve the goal of making you look tan, but it has some effects that might run contrary to the "healthy" moniker. Isotopes are groups of atoms of the same type and they are the root of a lot of the problems associated with UV rays.

Ultraviolet Light

• The part of the light that causes skin to tan (and burn) from exposure is called "ultraviolet light." The rays are not visible to the human eye. Energy like light and sound are measured in "wavelengths." It represents the distance between two peaks in a wave. The wave length determines the color of light and whether a wave of energy is visible or audible (or neither). Ultraviolet waves are shorter than visible light waves.

Skin Color Changes

• When the skin is exposed to ultraviolet radiation there is cellular disruption. That disruption of the cells (and more specifically the isotopes in the cells) is responsible for the skin color change. Short term exposure to ultraviolet rays might cause no damage. Longer term exposure can cause mild damage and leave a person "tanned." Longer exposure can cause more extreme cellular disruption and the red coloration and other effects of a sun burn.

Benefits of Ultraviolet Exposure

• While ultraviolet exposure can cause some negative effects, there are positive ones, too. For one thing, humans need vitamin D for survival. The body produces vitamin D from exposure to ultraviolet rays. In addition, certain skin conditions, like eczema, can be treated by controlled exposure to ultraviolet light. Undertaking an ultraviolet treatment regimen for any health condition should be approved by and monitored by a doctor, though.

Free Radicals

• When ultraviolet rays interact with living tissue, they rip ions away from the atoms. That's how they cause damage to your isotopes. This has an effect of killing some types of bacteria. However, for more complicated life forms, like humans, this creates something called "free radicals." Free radicals are basically unstable atoms and they are considered by scientists and the medical community to be one of the causes of cancer.

Immune System Changes

• According to the World Health Organization, exposure to ultraviolet rays affects the immune system. They say that this stripping away of ions causes changes in both the distribution and activity of the cells in the body that are responsible for developing immune response. That makes a person more susceptible to infections. For example, they say that it can cause reactivation of the Herpes simplex virus (which causes "cold sores").