A bioluminescent Christmas Tree (Photo New Scientisthttps://www.newscientist.com/article/mg26435214-200-bioluminescent-christmas-tree-glows-with-festive-cheer/)
Dear Readers, having waxed lyrical about the wonders of the Toronto Eaton Centre Christmas tree yesterday, how about this one? It’s made from blocks of balsa wood impregnated with Ringless Honey Fungus (Desarmillaria tabescens).
Ringless Honey Fungus (Photo byThis image was created by user Dan Molter (shroomydan) at Mushroom Observer, a source for mycological images.CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)
The mycelium of this fungus is bioluminescent – when exposed to air, an enzyme in the fungus produces a chemical called luciferin, which glows green and gives this rather eerie effect – I must say that the ‘tree’ reminds me more of the Blair Witch Project than something festive, but maybe it’s just me. Luciferin, though, is extremely cool – it’s actually a family of several chemicals that produce light, and can be found in many living things, from bacteria and various sea microorganisms to squid and shrimps. In the photo below, a marine organism known as a dinoflagellate is bioluminescent when agitated, in this case by the movement of the waves.
Dinoflagellate bioluminescence (Photo by By Mike – Red Tide at midnight, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8957092)
So, the makers of the Christmas tree wonder if the bioluminescence could be harnessed to make eco-friendly household lighting. There have been experiments using light-producing algae in the past, but keeping the algae happy and alive for any length of time has proven to be tricky. Plus, living things tend not to like extremes of temperature, so the possibility of having eco-friendly outdoor lighting using bioluminescence in, say, Toronto (where it’s currently -15 degrees) is pretty slim. Finally, although the light emitted is pretty, you aren’t going to be able to read a book by it. Still, it will be interesting to see what the scientists come up with.