• Question: if there are three main light sources (fire,sunlight and electricity) were does the angler fish get its light?

    Asked by blake to Glo on 16 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Gloeta Massie

      Gloeta Massie answered on 16 Jun 2011:

      You’ve been hanging out with too many earth scientists, Blake. REAL cool light comes from life! Inside that angler fish ‘fishing lure’ is a massive awesome chemical reaction known as bioluminescence. (bio – life; lumen – light). Biolum is light is COOL – literally! Unlike your three super hot flaming examples, the light produced in bioluminescent reactions generates very little heat energy. It’s created through a series of chemical reactions using enzymes known as luciferases. (Cmon – how cool is that name – from the Latin sucem (light) ferre (bring) + ase (the suffix used for enzymes) light-bringing-enzyme. I am just giddy thinking about! ) Now, many bioluminescent animals create their own light; however, in the case of angler fish, they cheat a bit and use bioluminescent bacteria. (Some squid do this, too!)

      Check THIS out: http://youtu.be/RGtPF0I07wk
      And this one on glowing dinoflagellates: http://youtu.be/-nBS3vgHOHg
      Last but definitely not least: http://www.lifesci.ucsb.edu/~biolum/

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