If you are new to quantum health or have ever struggled to explain it to your family and friends, I want to spend some time today going back to the basics.

Over the last several years, I have watched the terms quantum health, quantum biology, circadian health, and circadian biology become increasingly common in conversations about wellness. At the same time, I have noticed a growing amount of confusion about what these terms actually mean. Some people assume they refer to a particular diet, supplement protocol, or biohacking trend. Others dismiss them altogether because they sound unfamiliar, overly scientific, or not scientific enough.

None of these is really accurate.

My hope is that this article helps you better understand what “quantum" health is, why so many people are becoming interested in it, and why I believe it represents one of the most important shifts happening in our understanding of human health. Whether you are simply curious or have already begun applying these ideas in your own life, my goal is to give you a framework that makes the rest of this work easier to understand.

But at its core, quantum health is a framework for understanding human health through the relationship between your biology and your environment. Rather than focusing only on the chemistry inside the body, it emphasizes how environmental information, especially light, water, magnetism, circadian rhythms, and other natural signals, influence mitochondrial function and, ultimately, your health.

What You'll Hear It Called

If you spend any time exploring this field, you will probably notice that people use several different terms to describe it.

You may hear it referred to as quantum health, quantum biology, circadian health, or circadian biology. These terms are often used interchangeably, although they are not perfectly synonymous, and different educators have different preferences.

Personally, I tend to describe my work today as biophysics or circadian health. But I still use the phrase quantum health throughout this article because it remains one of the most common ways people first discover this perspective, and many people search for exactly that phrase when they begin learning.

Regardless of the terminology, the underlying idea is remarkably consistent.

Your health is influenced not only by your genes, your nutrition, or your biochemistry, but also by the constant stream of environmental information your body receives every second of every day. Light, darkness, temperature, water, movement, magnetism, seasonal rhythms, and your relationship with the natural world all provide signals that help regulate how your biology functions.

Understanding those signals changes the way we think about health.

A Different Way of Looking at Health

Most conversations about health begin by asking what has gone wrong.

Why am I exhausted?
Why are my hormones out of balance?
Why can I not lose weight?
Why does my inflammation keep coming back?
Why do I feel like I am doing everything "right" and still not getting better?

Modern medicine has become extraordinarily good at identifying disease, performing lifesaving interventions, and using sophisticated testing to understand what is happening inside the body. Functional medicine has expanded that conversation by looking more deeply at nutrition, gut health, hormones, genetics, environmental toxins, and other contributors to chronic illness.

Those approaches have tremendous value, and they continue to save and improve countless lives every day.

Quantum and circadian health are not intended to replace them. Rather, they ask a different question.

Instead of asking only, "What is happening inside the body?" they also ask, "What has been shaping the body's biology in the first place?"

That distinction may seem subtle, but it changes everything.

Rather than viewing the body primarily through the lens of chemistry, this perspective recognizes that our biology is constantly responding to information from the environment around us. Every cell in your body is continuously adapting to the signals it receives, and those signals influence countless physiological processes long before they ever appear on a blood test or become noticeable as symptoms.

• The food you eat is information.
• The light entering your eyes is information.
• The quality of your sleep is information.
• The temperature around you is information.
• Even the timing of those experiences is information.

From this perspective, your body is not simply reacting to nutrients or medications. It is responding to an ongoing conversation with its environment, one that has been taking place every second of your life.

Why This Perspective Resonates with So Many People

Many of the people who eventually find quantum and circadian health are not new to improving their health.

In fact, they are often some of the most well-read, committed, and proactive people I meet.

They have worked with talented practitioners. They have changed their diets. They have invested in functional testing, supplements, therapies, and countless appointments. Many have seen meaningful improvements along the way.

Yet they still feel as though they are missing a foundational piece of the puzzle.

That was certainly true for me.

Like many others who now teach this work, I did not discover quantum health because I was searching for a new philosophy. I found it because I was trying to understand why certain patterns kept appearing in myself and in the people I worked with, despite doing many of the things that should have helped.

When I found quantum health, it became clear that many chronic health challenges make much more sense when we stop looking only at the chemistry occurring inside the body and begin asking what environmental conditions created that chemistry in the first place.

That does not mean conventional medicine is wrong. It does not mean functional medicine is wrong.

It simply means they are often answering different questions.

For me, quantum and circadian health provide another layer of understanding. One that is often more foundational. They help explain why our biology behaves the way it does and, perhaps more importantly, why changing our relationship with the environment can sometimes create improvements that surprise even people who have spent years trying everything else.

Why Is It Called "Quantum Health"? 

If you have made it this far, you may still be wondering where the word quantum comes from in the first place.

That is a fair question, and one that understandably creates confusion.

For many years, educators used phrases like quantum biology and quantum health to describe a growing body of work recognizing that living organisms are not exempt from the same physical laws that govern the rest of the natural world. Researchers began exploring how light, electricity, magnetism, water, and other aspects of our environment influence biological function, leading many educators to adopt "quantum" as a shorthand for this broader perspective on health.

Today, different people prefer different terminology. Some describe their work primarily through the lens of circadian biology, others continue to use quantum health or quantum biology, and many use a combination of these terms. Regardless of the language, the central idea remains remarkably similar: our biology is continuously responding to the environment around us.

For me, however, the value of this work has never been about the label itself. It is about recognizing that our bodies are inseparable from the natural world, and that understanding our relationship with light, water, magnetism, time, and our environment often helps explain patterns that biochemistry alone cannot.

Ultimately, the terminology matters far less than the principles themselves.

A Field Built by Many People

One of the biggest misconceptions about quantum and circadian health is that it originated with a single educator or a singular particular philosophy.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Like every developing field, this perspective has evolved through the work of researchers, clinicians, educators, and curious thinkers approaching similar questions from different directions. Some devoted their careers to studying water. Others explored bioelectricity, connective tissue, photobiology, chronobiology, fascia, sound, or the remarkable ways living systems organize themselves.

Many of these individuals would never have described themselves as "quantum health" educators. Others actively use that language today. Together, however, their work has profoundly influenced how many of us understand health and disease.

Researchers & Early Pioneers
Among those whose work has helped shape this broader field are:

• Jerry Tennant
• Gerald Pollack
• Mae-Wan Ho
• Viktor Schauberger
• James Oschman
• Rupert Sheldrake
• Martin Pall
• Alexander Wunsch
• Fritz-Albert Popp
• Jack Kruse

Modern Educators & Clinicians
Today, many clinicians and educators continue expanding, testing, refining, and applying these ideas through research, education, and clinical practice. Some of the people who have influenced my own thinking include:

• Sara Pugh
• Dr. Catherine Clinton
• Sarah Kleiner
• Peter Forhan
• Nick Pineault
• Dr. Stephen Hussey
• Veda Austin
• Robert Gourlay
• Roudy & Joy Nassif
• John Stuart Reid

And many others.

One of the things I appreciate most about this community is that it is not built on unanimous agreement.

There are areas where these researchers and educators disagree. New research challenges old assumptions. Clinical experience refines existing theories. That is exactly what healthy scientific inquiry should look like. Every researcher brings their own experiences, perspectives, and hypotheses to their work, which is why replication, healthy debate, and continued investigation are so important to the scientific process.

So I certainly do not agree with every conclusion reached by every person on those lists, and I would not expect anyone else to either. But I believe each has made valuable contributions to our collective understanding of how the environment influences biology, and I think it is important to recognize that this work has grown through the efforts of many people rather than any single voice.

The Framework Through Which Quantum & Circadian Health View Disease

Although every educator explains this work a little differently, most practitioners within the fields of quantum and circadian health share a common understanding of how health is created and, conversely, how disease develops.

At its core, this framework begins with the relationship between your body and its environment.

Every second of every day, your biology is receiving information from the world around you. Light, water, electrons, magnetism, food, temperature, movement, seasonal rhythms, and countless other aspects of the natural world provide signals that tell your body how to function. Some of these signals have been present throughout human history. Others, such as artificial light and many forms of non-native electromagnetic radiation, are relatively new.

The quality of those signals matters because they are continually shaping how your cells behave.

Light, Water, Electrons & Magnetism
In quantum and circadian health, light, water, and magnetism are considered some of the body's most fundamental environmental signals. These are often the first places practitioners begin because they provide the information your body uses to understand the world around it.

Thought to be most foundational: Light.

Natural light tells your body what time of day and season it is, helping regulate everything from hormone production and metabolism to sleep, immune function, and countless other biological processes.

Water does far more than hydrate the body. It is essential for energy production itself, playing a central role in ATP generation, the production of metabolic (cellular) water within the mitochondria, and the formation of exclusion-zone (EZ) water that helps organize and transfer energy and information throughout the body. This is why quantum and circadian health view water as far more than something we simply drink. It is one of the fundamental ingredients of healthy cellular function.

Likewise, because the human body is inherently electrical, movement, contact with the Earth's magnetic field, and the electromagnetic environment around us all influence how our biology functions.

When these foundational environmental signals are consistently aligned with nature, they create the conditions for healthier cellular function throughout the body.

Of course, additional “signals” exist, but these are often the initial and most foundational “inputs” practitioners teach because they are seen as the biggest “levers” for human health.

Mitochondria
If light, water, and magnetism are among the body's primary environmental signals, mitochondria are the organelles receiving, interpreting, and responding to those signals. 

This is one of the defining ideas of quantum and circadian health.

Most of us learned in school that mitochondria are the "powerhouses of the cell." While that is true, it is only part of the story.

Yes, mitochondria produce ATP, the energy currency that powers nearly every process in the body. But they also produce metabolic (cellular) water and generate melatonin within the cell itself, often called subcellular or mitochondrial melatonin, which is distinct from the pineal melatonin most people associate with regulating sleep. In many ways, they act less like simple batteries and more like sophisticated environmental sensors, continually adapting cellular function in response to the environmental information they receive.

This is why quantum and circadian health view mitochondrial function as foundational to virtually every aspect of health.

Rather than viewing chronic disease as a collection of separate conditions affecting different organs or body systems, this framework recognizes that every organ, tissue, and cell depends upon healthy mitochondrial function. From this perspective, virtually every chronic disease and dysfunction is mitochondrial in nature because every cell depends upon healthy mitochondria to produce energy, communicate effectively, repair damage, adapt to stress, and maintain normal function.

That does not mean every disease presents the same way. Symptoms differ because different combinations of environmental signals can influence mitochondrial function in different tissues and organ systems over time. Where that dysfunction develops, and which environmental signals have been disrupted, both influence how disease ultimately manifests.

As a result, the conversation shifts. Rather than beginning with the question, "What symptom am I experiencing?" it begins with another:

"What information, in the form of environmental signals, are my mitochondria consistently being asked to function within?"

That question changes everything.

Instead of focusing only on the chemistry that appears downstream, quantum and circadian health seek to improve the environmental information your mitochondria receive each day. As those signals become more aligned with nature, mitochondrial function can improve, allowing healthier physiology to emerge throughout the body.

Aether
The final component of this framework is one I have come to appreciate more deeply over time.

While aether has been understood and described in different ways throughout history, I think of it as the medium through which information and communication occur. It provides another way of understanding how our thoughts, beliefs, emotions, intentions, relationships, and broader energetic environment may influence our biology.

In other words, it represents another layer of information influencing the mitochondria. While light, water, and magnetism are primarily physical environmental signals, aether expands the conversation to include the ways information may also be communicated through our energetic environment.

We are more waves than matter, after all.

From this perspective, concepts such as the biofield, energy healing, and the influence of mindset are not separate from health. They are part of the larger conversation about how information moves throughout living systems and how our bodies perceive and respond to the world around them.

Like many aspects of quantum and circadian health, this is a topic worthy of much deeper exploration than one introductory article can provide. For now, I simply want to introduce it as another important part of the broader framework through which I understand health.

A New Lens Through Which to Understand Health 

That does not mean every answer has been discovered or that this field has every solution. Like all areas of science, it continues to evolve as researchers, clinicians, and educators ask better questions and deepen our understanding of how the body works. 

I also do not believe any one modality should ever be viewed as the complete answer to health. While quantum and circadian health have dramatically changed the way I understand biology, and I have seen them help people make progress where other approaches have historically struggled, I believe we all benefit when different fields of knowledge complement one another rather than compete.

In fact, this is something I see repeatedly among the practitioners I teach. Some of the most meaningful transformations happen not when someone abandons their existing expertise, but when they begin viewing it through the lens of circadian and quantum health. Whether someone's background is medicine, nutrition, chiropractic, physical therapy, bodywork, mental health, or another discipline entirely, this framework often helps explain why the therapies they already use work, why they sometimes do not, and how they can become even more effective.

But one thing has become increasingly clear to me:

Our environment is not simply the backdrop against which life and health happen. It is an active participant in shaping it.

And when we begin changing the information we give our biology, we often begin changing the biology itself.

FAQs

Is quantum health scientifically proven?
Many of the concepts discussed within quantum and circadian health are grounded in well-established disciplines such as chronobiology, photobiology, mitochondrial biology, and biophysics. If you would like to explore the research yourself, I have compiled many high-quality scientific papers on my Science page. You may also check out the “Books” list provided on this page.

At the same time, this is an evolving field. As our understanding of human biology continues to expand, new discoveries regularly deepen, refine, and sometimes challenge what we know today.

Why doesn't my doctor recommend, or why do they actively discount or discourage, many of the recommendations taught in circadian health?
Most physicians genuinely want the best for their patients. However, many are working within modern healthcare systems that often constrain their ability to spend the time they would like with patients, explore emerging research, or address the environmental factors that may contribute to chronic disease. Beyond that, medicine is constantly evolving, and it often takes 10 or more years, sometimes as many as 17 depending on the field, for new research to become part of routine clinical practice.

That delay is only one part of the story. The history of sunlight, heliotherapy, public health recommendations, and the emerging science surrounding circadian biology is far more nuanced than most people realize.

I have written an entire article exploring why many of these ideas are not yet widely taught in medicine, how scientific understanding changes over time, and why I believe that conversation is continuing to evolve today.

What is the first step in improving health, according to circadian biology?
Rather than trying to change everything at once, I encourage people to begin with the fundamentals. For most people, that means first understanding how environmental signals, especially light, influence the body, and then consistently applying those principles over time. Some great resources to do this? My 5-Day Intro Challenge or my Protocols.

In other words, lay the foundation first and give your biology time to respond. Once those foundational pieces are in place, you can begin addressing more nuanced or individual challenges. That is often where working with an experienced practitioner, or asking questions within a learning community like mine, can help you continue making progress.

What is mitochondrial health?
Mitochondria are often called the powerhouses of the cell because they produce the energy every cell needs to function. But they are so much more than this. Within quantum and circadian health, mitochondrial function is viewed as foundational because every organ and tissue depends on healthy mitochondria to communicate, repair, and adapt to the environment.

Why does light matter so much for health?
Light is far more than something that helps you see. It is one of the primary ways your body tells time and regulates circadian rhythms, hormone production, metabolism, sleep, immune function, and countless other biological processes. 

Can I be trained in circadian health? 
Yes. If you are a healthcare practitioner, coach, or wellness professional who wants to better understand how circadian health applies to your existing work, or if you are someone who wants to become a health practitioner of any kind, I offer advanced training through my Mentorship community.

Rather than replacing your current expertise, my goal is to help you integrate these principles into the work you already do. Members receive practitioner-specific education, weekly discussions, clinical application, business guidance, and the opportunity to earn an optional Certificate of Completion in Applied Quantum and Circadian Health.

If you are not a practitioner, you can still continue learning through my online community, Sol Circle, which includes live classes, Q&As, seasonal challenges, and a searchable library of hundreds of hours of education designed for anyone interested in improving their health.