TOP / Publications / Abstracts of papers in J. of IEIJ / J. of IEIJ Vol.89, No.11

The Abstracts of the Papers J.Illum. Engng. Inst. Jpn.Vol. 89, 2005

No.11  November

CONTENTS

Papers

Perceived Whiteness under Different Lighting Conditions

A. OOTA, S. KANAYA, M. AYAMA and K. MUKAI

773

Breakdown Mechanism of Fluorescent Lamp Electrodes Operated by Resonance Inverter Circuits —Phenomena of Fluorescent Lamp Electrodes at the End-of-life—

Y. WATANABE, Y. OISHI, Y. KUROKAWA and R. ENOKI

782

Research on the Effect of Colored Lights on Evaluation and Range of Discomfort Glare

M. HSIEH, J. MUNAKATA and K. HIRATE

788

Relationship between Fatigue and Functional Visual Field

T. NAGURA and T. IRIKURA

794

 

ABSTRACTS

Perceived Whiteness under Different Lighting Conditions
Akiko OOTA, Sueko KANAYA, Miyoshi AYAMA and Kenji MUKAI

Many white and/or nearly white objects are in our living and working areas, such as documents written on white paper, white curtains, white clothes, and white walls and furniture. The perceived whiteness of these objects is important to the impression of lighting in these areas. To investigate the perceived whiteness in living areas, a series of experiments were conducted using four differ-ent fluorescent lamps in three different environmental conditions.

It was found that the areas of perceived whiteness in the living areas were larger than the areas of perceived whiteness under achromatic conditions. Based on the results of these results, a perceived whiteness index is proposed for these experimental conditions.

KEYWORDS : whiteness area, fluorescent lamp, color temperature, achromatic room, living room

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Breakdown Mechanism of Fluorescent Lamp Electrodes Operated by Resonance Inverter Circuits —Phenomena of Fluorescent Lamp Electrodes at the End-of-life—
Yoshio WATANABE, Yo OISHI, Yoshiki KUROKAWA and Ryoji ENOKI

Fluorescent lamp electrodes breakdown when the oxide on their coil electrodes is exhausted at the end-of-life. Two types of breakdown mechanisms are observed in oxide-less coil electrodes depending on the operation mode. When a lamp is operated continuously after ignition, breakdown occurs at the point where the coil electrode connects to its supporting lead after around 8 seconds. If the lamp is operated using cycles of 4 seconds on and 12 seconds off, breakdown will occur at the coiling part of the coil electrode after around 170 seconds. The experimental results show that the former breakdown mechanism is due to ion bombardment and the latter is due to the evaporation of tungsten wire. Discharge current concentration at the point connecting a coil electrode and its supporting lead, which causes the ion bombardment, will begin after 7 seconds or more, and is independent of the electrode temperature. Thus, if the operation of a lamp at the end-of-life stops within 6 seconds of starting by using a protection circuit, the breakdown due to ion bombardment will be prevented.

KEYWORDS : fluorescent lamp, electrode at the end-of-life, half-bridge inverter circuit

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Research on the Effect of Colored Lights on Evaluation and Range of Discomfort Glare
Mingyeh HSIEH, Jun MUNAKATA and Kotaroh HIRATE

Previous research showed that colored light affects Lan-dolt C test performance, and increasing the relative con-tribution of short-wavelength ( blue ) light will re-duce pupil size and increase visual acuity. However, whether the evaluation of discomfort glare differs when the color of light differs is unknown. The aim of this research is to investigate the effect of colored lights on the evaluation and range of discomfort glare.

Among the nine colored lights we selected, at the same luminance level, blue light causes the most discomfort glare, and green light causes the least discomfort glare. The order of discomfort glare is approximately blue, white, red or yellow, and green. We also found that a subject’s evaluation of discomfort glare becomes more intense when color temperature is increased. In addi-tion, after comparing our result with Helmholtz- Kohl-rausch phenomenon, we found that people’s range of discomfort glare under each colored light were different. Our study shows that the color of light affects the evaluation of discomfort glare. Therefore, using colored lights as a technique to reduce the level of discomfort glare is possible.

KEYWORDS : color, glare, luminance, color temperature, latitude, brightness

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Relationship between Fatigue and Functional Visual Field
Tatsuya NAGURA and Takashi IRIKURA

A vigilance task like driving a vehicle causes eye fatigue. We previously measured the visual search time for a single flashing light out of 101 stimuli after vigilance tasks of various duration. A CRT display was used to generate the stimuli: containing 1 flashing light and 100 steady lights. We found that the longer the vigilance task, the longer the visual search time. We have now investigated the effect of a vigilance task on the functional visual field. We found that a functional visual field gradually narrows as vigilance task is lengthened. This indicates that narrowing of the functional visual field is a factor contributing to eye fatigue and lengthening of the visual search time.

KEYWORDS : vigilance task, eye fatigue, vehicle driv-ing, functional visual field, visual search time

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