Luminaire and methodologies for combined visible illumination and deactivation of bacteria

Abstract

A controller for a disinfection system comprises a processor and memory comprising data accessible to the processor and firmware which when executed by the processor cause the controller to perform operations. The operations comprising causing a first light source to emit a white light into a space, and causing, during an emission of the white light, a second light source to emit pulses of visible cleansing light including one or more wavelengths of light that deactivate bacteria into the space at pulse times concurrent with the emission of the white light from the first light source. The controller controls the first and second light sources such that an intensity of a pulse emission of the visible cleansing light is higher than an intensity of the white light emission for all states of the space regardless of whether the space is occupied or unoccupied by a human.