Bioluminescent Plant
Kusuma M H
Lecturer-Dept of Botany
GFGC Tumkur
kusumamhemarajukummi@gmail.com
Bioluminescence is the production and emission of light by a living organism. It is a form of chemiluminescence. Bioluminescence occurs widely in marine vertebrates and invertebrates, as well as in some fungi, microorganisms including some bioluminescent bacteria and terrestrial invertebrates such as fireflies. Though humans can't create our own light, some animals do, in a process called bioluminescence. Fireflies are perhaps the best known example, though many other species are bioluminescent, including glow worms, anglerfish, and octopus. Even some plants, such as mushrooms and other fungi, are bioluminescent.
What causes bioluminescence ?
Bioluminescent organisms can glow in complete darkness. They contain a unique compound called luciferin, according to scientists who study bioluminescence at the University of California at Santa Barbara. When luciferin is exposed to oxygen, a chemical reaction (aided along by an enzyme called luciferase) emits light.
Whether plants show bioluminescence?
What allows some plants and animals to create their own light?
It's all about energy. Most people know that chemical energy can be released as heat that's how the food we eat gets transformed into body heat. In bioluminescent organisms, that chemical energy can also be released in the form of light.
A team research on bioluminescence
A team of MIT research have engineered plants that glow in the dark, using luciferase, the enzyme that lights up firefly butts.
“The vision is to make a plant that will function as a desk lamp - a lamp that you don’t have to plug in,” says Professor Michael Strano, the study’s senior author. “The light is ultimately powered by the energy metabolism of the plant itself.”
Strano cites a study claiming that lighting is responsible for about 20-percent of energy consumption worldwide. Glow-in-the dark plants could potentially alleviate some of that strain, using their own energy to illuminate a space after nightfall. Of course, that’s all still a ways off. So far, the team has been able to make a plant glow for around three-and-a half hours, but the illumination they give off is apparently one-thousandth of the light required to read by.
According to MIT, this isn’t the first time scientists have attempted to use these enzymes to light up plants, but the process the team is using has improved efficiency quite a bit. The process involves dunking plants in a solution made out of luciferase, luciferin and coenzyme A (a combination of which creates fireflies’ glow) and applying pressure that essentially forces the solution into plant pores.
The researchers are also able to turn the light off by adding a luciferase inhibitor, which doubles as a sort of chemical light switch for when it’s time to turn those glowing plants off.