Possibly related: Francisco Gomez-Lima has been doing some interesting work with trans-cranial (through the forehead) infrared lasers. It helps people with mild cognitive impairment on a measurable way. He's shown that what it's improving is down-regulated cytochrome c oxidase, which impairs the electron transfer chain in mitochondria; photons stand in for the electrons that are missing (photons and electrons are similar, except electrons have mass). It's a localized effect (frontal cortex), but he's done a lot of other work using methylene blue to do similar (donate electrons) on a more systemic basis. Also some fMRI work in this same area.

Oh - and excellent first article!