Matt Davis
A preserved specimen of the Blue Lanternfish (Tarletonbeania) with bioluminescent photophores.
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Bioluminescent animals have the power of light. Sometimes they emit a bright glow from one specialized body part, trying to attract prey or mates. Sometimes they radiate dimly on the undersides of their bodies for camouflage counter-illumination, hiding their shadows on the seafloor by matching the light levels coming from the surface. As weird as it sounds, bioluminescence turns out to be an incredibly beneficial adaptation. A new study shows that it has evolved no less than 27 times in biological history, for countless reasons.
A group of zoologists described how bioluminescence evolved in the journal PLoS One, noting that 80 percent of glowing animals live in the oceans. Only a few land animals emit light, and they are all arthropods like fireflies and millipedes. There are only two ways that animals start radiating. Either they have intrinsic bioluminescence, mixing chemicals in their bodies to regulate the color and intensity of light, or they have symbiotic bioluminescence, cultivating colonies of glowing bacteria in specialized organs or pouches. The question that intrigued the researchers was why so many animals adapted to their environments by starting to glow.
University of Kansas evolutionary biologist Leo Smith, who contributed to the study, told Ars that fish use their built-in lights for many different reasons. In coastal areas, fish use patterns of flashing lights to "communicate during mating," which is important because they live in sandy areas where visibility is low. Like aquatic ravers on the prowl, these fish also use light patterns to recognize each other in areas where many species swim together. Fish that live in the deeper ocean also flash their mates, but they mainly use bioluminescence like flashlights to find prey.
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