From deep-sea fish to fireflies, dozens of organisms use bioluminescence to help themselves be seen in the natural world. But can we harness them to light our towns and cities?

从深海鱼到萤火虫，自然界中有几十种生物利用生物发光使自己被看到，但我们能否利用它们照亮我们的城镇？

In a tranquil side room of the Covid-19 vaccination centre in Rambouillet, a small French town around 30 miles (50km) south-west of Paris, a soft blue light emanated from a row of cylindrical tubes. Members of the public who received a vaccine last year were invited to bathe in the glow for a few minutes while they waited in the recovery area.

朗布依埃是一座位于巴黎西南约30英里（50公里）的法国小镇，在新冠疫苗接种中心一间安静的观察室里，一排圆管发出柔和的蓝光。去年，接种过疫苗的市民会被安排去观察区等待几分钟，同时沐浴在这种光线中。
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Soon, the same azure glow will illuminate the nearby, tree-lined Place André Thomé et Jacqueline Thomé-Patenôtre, located just across from the aptly named La Lanterne performance hall, at night. These ethereal experiments are also underway across France, including at the capital's Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle airport.

不久后，这种蔚蓝色光将在夜晚照亮附近绿树成荫的安德烈·托姆与杰奎琳·托梅·帕特诺特广场，正对面是“灯笼”表演馆，名字很贴切。法国各地都在进行这种超凡的实验，包括巴黎的夏尔·戴高乐机场。

But unlike standard streetlamps, which often emit a harsh glare and need to be hooked up to the electricity grid, these otherworldly lights are powered by living organisms through a process known as bioluminescence.

但它不像普通路灯那样发出刺眼的强光，而且需要连接电网，这些超凡脱俗的光源由生物提供能量，这种方法被称为生物发光。

This phenomenon – where chemical reactions inside an organism's body produce light – can be observed in many places in nature. Organisms as diverse as fireflies, fungi and fish have the ability to glow through bioluminescence. It is present in 76% of deep-sea creatures and has independently evolved dozens of times, including at least 27 occasions in marine fish alone.

这种现象在自然界中并不罕见，生物体内的化学反应产生光亮。萤火虫、菌类、鱼类等多种生物都具备生物发光能力。76%的深海生物拥有这种能力，而且独立进化了几十次，仅仅海洋鱼类就进化了至少27次。

The uses of bioluminescence in the natural world are just as wide-ranging. Fireflies light up to attract mates while some species of algae glow when the surrounding water is disturbed. Deepsea anglerfish allow bioluminescent bacteria to take up residence on a lobe above their head as a tantalising lure for prey.

生物发光在自然界的用途很广泛。萤火虫发光吸引配偶，某些藻类在四周海水被搅动时会发光，深海的琵琶鱼允许生物发光细菌寄居在头顶的圆形突起物里，作为诱饵来吸引猎物。


Marine algae can produce an eery glow in the water when they are disturbed by waves, boats or swimmers

当受到海浪、船只、游泳者惊扰时，海藻会在水里发出奇异的光。

Most bioluminescent ocean species emit a blue-green light, which, due to the shorter wavelengths of the colours, can travel further in the ocean. Some fireflies and certain snails glow yellow, and the so-called "railroad worm", a beetle larvae native to the Americas, is known to turn both red and greenish-yellow in a dotted pattern that resembles a train at night. Springhares – nocturnal rodents found in southern Africa – have even been found to have hair that produces a vivid pink biofluorescent glow.

海洋里的大多数生物发光物种发出蓝绿色光，由于这种颜色的波长较短，所以在海洋里的传播距离较远。某些萤火虫和蜗牛能发出黄光，美洲有一种俗称“铁道虫”的甲虫幼虫，它能发出红色和黄绿色的光点，看上去犹如夜晚的火车。春兔是南非一种夜间活动的啮齿动物，人们发现它的皮毛能发出亮粉色的生物荧光。

The turquoise blue glow bathing the waiting room in Rambouillet, meanwhile, comes from a marine bacterium gathered off the coast of France called Aliivibrio fischeri. The bacteria are stored inside saltwater-filled tubes, allowing them to circulate in a kind of luminous aquarium. Since the light is generated through internal biochemical processes that are part of the organism's normal metabolism, running it requires almost no energy other than that needed to produce the food the bacteria consume. A mix of basic nutrients is added and air is pumped through the water to provide oxygen. To "turn off the lights", the air is simply cut off, halting the process by sending the bacteria into an anaerobic state where it does not produce bioluminescence.

另外，人们在法国沿海采集到一种名为“费氏弧菌”的海洋细菌，朗布依埃小镇的观察室里的碧蓝色光就是由它们发出的。这种细菌被储存在充满海水的圆管内，使它们在这种发光水族箱内自由流动。由于这种光来自生物体内的生化过程，是该生物正常新陈代谢的一部分，所以除了为细菌制造食物以外，这种灯光几乎不消耗能源。只需添加混合的基本养料，将空气泵入水中供氧。如果想要“关灯”，那就完全切断空气，让细菌进入无氧状态，它们就会停止生物发光。

"Our goal is to change the way in which cities use light," says Sandra Rey, founder of the French start-up Glowee, which is behind the project in Rambouillet. "We want to create an ambiance that better respects citizens, the environment and biodiversity – and to impose this new philosophy of light as a real alternative."

“我们的目标是改变城市的照明方式”，法国初创企业Glowee的创始人桑德拉·雷伊说道，该公司是朗布依埃项目的幕后推手。“我们希望创造一种更加尊重市民、环境、生物多样性的氛围，让这种新的照明理念成为真正的选择”。
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Proponents like Rey argue bioluminescence produced by bacteria could be an energy-efficient, sustainable way to light up our lives. The way we currently produce light, she argues, has changed little since the first light bulb was developed in 1879. While the LED-bulb, which emerged in the 1960s, has significantly reduced the running costs of lighting, it still depends on electricity, which is largely produced by burning fossil fuels.

雷伊等支持者认为，细菌的生物发光有望成为一种节能、可持续的方式来点亮我们的生活。她认为自1879年首枚灯泡问世以来，我们现有的照明方式变化不大。虽然20世纪60年代问世的LED灯泡极大降低了照明成本，但仍然依赖电能，而电能主要通过化石燃料的燃烧来产生。


Glowee grows the marine bacterium Aliivibrio fischeri in salt water and a mix of nutrients – the bacteria glow when they are given oxygen

Glowee公司在海水和混合养料中培养海洋“费氏弧菌”，它有氧环境下发光。

Founded in 2014, Glowee is developing a liquid raw material – in theory endlessly renewable – made of bioluminescent microorganisms. It is cultivated in saltwater aquariums before being packaged in the aquarium tubes. The manufacturing process, claims Rey, consumes less water than manufacturing LED lights and releases less CO2, while the liquid is also biodegradable. The lights also use less electricity to run than LEDs, according to the company, although the Glowee bulbs produce fewer lumens of light than most modern LED bulbs.

创立于2014年的Glowee公司正在研发一种由发光微生物构成的液态原料，理论上可以无限再生。首先放入海水水族箱中培养，然后封装在圆管水族箱里。雷伊表示，相比制造LED灯，这种制造工艺耗水更少，产生的二氧化碳更少，而且该液体可以生物降解。据公司透露，这种光源比LED耗电更少，但Glowee灯泡的亮度低于大多数的现代LED灯泡。

While Glowee's lights are currently only available in standard tubes for events, the company is planning to produce several types of street furniture, such as outdoor benches with in-built lighting, soon.

目前，Glowee光源只能以标准圆管的形态为环境提供照明，该公司计划尽快生产几种街道设施，例如：配有内置照明的户外长凳。

In 2019, Rambouillet city hall signed a partnership with Glowee and invested €100,000 (£83,300/$109,000) to turn the town into "a full-scale bioluminescence laboratory".

2019年，朗布依埃市政府与Glowee公司签署合作协议，投资10万欧元（83300英镑/109000美元），把这座城镇打造成“全方位的生物发光实验室”。

Guillaume Douet, head of Rambouillet's public spaces, believes if the experiment is a success it could lead to a transformation across the country. "This is about a city of tomorrow," says Douet. "If the prototype really works, we can bring it to a large-scale deployment and replace current lighting systems."

朗布依埃的公共空间负责人纪尧姆·杜埃相信，如果实验成功，可能引发全国性的变革。“这关系到城市的未来”，杜埃说道。“如果原型确实可行，我们可以普及使用这种照明，并替换现有的照明系统”。

But bioluminescent lighting isn't new. In around 350BC, Greek philosopher Aristotle described bioluminescence in glow worms and fireflies as a type of "cold" light. Coal miners have used fireflies in jars as illumination in mines where any kind of flame – even a candle or lantern – could trigger a deadly explosion. Meanwhile, glowing fungi have for years been used by tribes in India to illuminate dense jungles.

但生物发光并非新鲜事物。大约在公元前350年，希腊哲学家亚里士多德将发光虫和萤火虫的生物发光描述为一种“冷”光。煤矿工人在矿井中使用萤火虫罐子照明，在这种环境中，任何明火都会引起致命性爆炸，哪怕是蜡烛或提灯。另外，印度的部落民族常年使用发光菌类照亮茂密的丛林。

Yet Glowee is the first company in the world to reach this level of experimentation, and the company says it is in negotiations with 40 cities across France, Belgium, Switzerland and Portugal. ERDF, a largely state-run company that manages France's electricity grid, is among Glowee's backers, the European Commission has provided €1.7m (£1.4m/$1.9) funding and France's National Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm) has given technical support.

但是，Glowee是世界上第一家达到这种实验水准的企业，该公司声称正在与法国、比利时、瑞士、葡萄牙的40个城市进行谈判。管理法国电网的ERDF公司基本上是国企，它是Glowee公司的资助方之一。欧盟委员会资助了170万欧元（140万英镑/190万美元），法国国家健康与医疗研究所提供了技术支持。

However, Carl Johnson, professor of biological sciences at Vanderbilt University, believes there are serious challenges still ahead before bioluminescence can get the green light for large-scale deployment.

但是，范德比尔特大学的生物学教授卡尔·约翰逊认为，在生物发光被批准大规模使用之前，仍有重大挑战有待于解决。

"First, you have to feed the bacteria and dilute them as they grow," he says. "That's not so easy. Also, the phenomenon will be very temperature-dependent and I doubt that it will work in the winter. Third, bioluminescence is very dim compared to electrical lighting. But perhaps they have improved the luminescence intensity."

“首先，你得培育发光细菌，当数量增加时需要进行稀释”，他说道。“这并非易事。其次，生物发光非常依赖温度，我怀疑在冬天是否可行。第三，生物发光相比电气照明非常暗淡。但也许他们增加了发光亮度”。

Glowee's Rey acknowledges those challenges ahead, but insists the benefits, both ecologically and economically, could see future cities bathed in bacterial blue light.

Glowee公司的雷伊承认面临这些挑战，但她坚信沐浴在细菌蓝光中的未来城市将在生态和经济上受益。

Currently, the Evry-based team is working to increase the light intensity produced by the bacteria – which for now only lasts days or weeks before requiring further nutrients and is not yet as strong as LED lights – by subjecting it to different temperatures and pressures. So far Glowee says its bacteria can produce an output of brightness of 15 lumens per square metre – short of, but not far off, the minimum 25 per square metre it believes is required for public lighting in parks and gardens. By comparison a 220 lumen household LED spotlight bulb can produce about 111 lumens per square metre of floor.

目前，来自法国埃夫里的团队正在致力于增加细菌发光的亮度。在各种温度和压力环境下，生物发光在不补充养料的前提下只能维持数天或数周，而且亮度不如LED光源。据Glowee公司透露，到目前为止，发光细菌可产生每平方米15流明的亮度输出，公司认为公园和花园所需要的公共照明亮度是每平方米25流明，尽管尚未达到这一目标，但差距不是太大。相比而言，220流明的家用LED聚光灯可以产生每平方米房屋面积111流明的亮度。

"We are advancing little by little," she says. "But we've made enormous steps already and our philosophy of light is a response to the crisis humanity is facing."

“我们正在逐渐地进步”，她说道。“但我们已经取得了巨大进步，我们的照明理念是应对人类正在面临的危机”。


Some fungi carry genes that allow them to produce bioluminescence and could be used to bioengineer plants that glow

某些菌类含有生物发光基因，可用于发光植物的生物工程改造。

Catrin Williams, a lecturer at Cardiff University's School of Biosciences who has studied bioluminescence in bacteria, agrees it is "difficult" to maintain living bacterial cultures long-term due to the need for the supply of nutrients.

卡迪夫大学生物科学学院的讲师卡特琳·威廉姆斯研究过细菌的生物发光，她认同长期维持活菌培养很难，因为这需要养料供应。

But Williams says this could be overcome by focusing on "chemiluminescence" – a process Glowee is also currently investigating – which removes the need for live bacteria. Instead, the enzyme responsible for bioluminescence, luciferase, can in theory be extracted from bacteria and used to produce light itself. "I think the Glowee approach is extremely novel and innovative and could be fantastic," she says.

但威廉姆斯表示，聚焦于“化学发光”可以解决这一难题，摆脱对活菌的依赖，目前Glowee公司也在研究这种工艺。生物发光是由“荧光素酶”造成的，理论上可以从细菌中提取这种酶，并利用它发光。“我认为Glowee公司的方法极具新颖性和创新性，可能棒极了”，她说道。

Other initiatives around the world are providing further glimmers of hope. Vancouver-based Nyoka Design Labs is developing a biodegradable alternative to glow sticks using non-living, cell-free enzymes, which the creators say are much easier to maintain than living bacteria. "Instead of using the whole car, we just take out the headlights," says Paige Whitehead, the founder and chief executive. "Enzymology has advanced to the extent that we no longer have to rely on the cell-supported systems."

世界各地的其他倡议也带来了更多希望的曙光。位于温哥华的Nyoka设计实验室正在研发一种可生物降解的方法，利用无生命、无细胞的酶代替荧光棒，发明人称这比维持活菌容易多了。“我们不是利用整台车，而是仅仅取出车灯”，该实验室的创始人和总裁佩奇·怀特海德说道。“酶学的进步足以让我们不再依赖细胞支撑的系统”。

Once used, glow sticks cannot be recycled due to the mixture of chemicals they contain. They are used in a wide range of applications, from law enforcement and military uses to music festival goers. Some researchers have raised concerns about the affect the chemicals they contain have on marine life, as they are also often used as lures in longline fishing.

荧光棒含有各种化学品，使用后无法被回收。从执法和军事用途到音乐节的观众，荧光棒的用途很广泛。研究人员担心，荧光棒含有的化学品会危害海洋生物，因为延绳钓法通常使用荧光棒作诱饵。

"So much of this waste is unnecessary," says Whitehead. "The vision we're going for is to replace any alternative lighting systems to make them more sustainable."

“没必要产生那么多废弃物”，怀特海德说道。“我们的愿景是替代其他照明系统，使它们具有更强的可持续性”。

In a major breakthrough for that vision, a study published in April 2020 revealed a team of Russian bioengineers working with a Moscow-based biotechnology startup who have created a method to sustain bioluminescence in plants. They claim they were able to make plants glow 10 times brighter and for longer than previous efforts – producing over 10 billion photons per minute – by bioengineering bioluminescent genes from fungi into the plants. The new research built on findings that identified a fungal version of luciferin, one of the unique compounds that is necessary for bioluminescence, alongside either of the enzymes luciferase or photoprotein.

2020年4月的一份研究报告显示，俄罗斯的一支生物工程师团队与位于莫斯科的一家生物技术初创企业展开合作，研究出一种维持植物生物发光的方法。他们声称通过生物工程改造，将菌类的生物发光基因移植到植物体内，相比之前的成果，这样能够使植物的发光亮度增强十倍，发光寿命更长，每分钟产生100亿个光子。这项新的研究是基于一种菌类荧光素的发现，与荧光素酶或荧光蛋白一样，它是生物发光必不可少的独特化合物之一。

Keith Wood, a scientist who 30 years ago created the first luminescent plant using a gene from fireflies, says the technology could in part replace artificial lighting like LEDs. More recently, he found that by altering the genetic structure of a luciferase found in the deep-sea shrimp Oplophorus gracilirostris, its brightness could be increased by 2.5 million times. The resulting enzyme, which the researchers called NanoLuc, was also 150 times brighter than the luciferases found in fireflies.

30年前，科学家基斯·伍德利用萤火虫的某个基因创造出第一株发光植物，他说这项技术在一定程度上可以代替LED等人工照明。他最近发现深海细脚刺虾（Oplophorus gracilirostris）含有一种荧光素酶，通过改造这种酶的基因结构，能使发光亮度提高250万倍。这种改造后的荧光素酶被命名为NanoLuc，比萤火虫的荧光素酶还要亮150倍。

"The application of synthetic biology onto bioluminescence is a massive opportunity," says Wood, who is now developing a bioluminescent plant for the company Light Bio.

“将合成生物学应用于生物发光是一个巨大的机遇”，伍德说道，他目前正在为Light Bio公司研发一种生物发光植物。

But exactly how these transgenic bioluminescent plants might be used in the future is still to be decided. One group of designers in Athens, led by Olympia Ardavani at the Hellenic Open University, laid out a vision of large numbers of bioluminescent plants being used to provide ambient lighting along the side of roads. They estimated that if a plant could be produced that would emit around 57 lumens of light each, they would need 40 plants in every 30m (98ft) on each side of the road in order to meet the lowest class of street lighting required on roads used by pedestrians in Europe.

然而在未来，如何利用这些转基因的生物发光植物尚无定论。希腊远程教育大学的奥林匹亚·阿达瓦尼带领一支雅典设计团队提出这样的愿景：大量的生物发光植物沿着路边提供环境照明。他们估算如果每株植物产生大约57流明的亮度，那么在道路的每一侧，每30米（98英尺）需要40株植物，才能满足欧洲人行道的最低级别的街道照明要求。

However, Rey believes harnessing the natural power of bioluminescence for lighting could also make us see the environment and natural world in new ways too. "It can create an ambiance that makes us more respectful citizens, of the environment and of biodiversity," she says.

然而雷伊认为，利用生物发光的自然之力提供照明，能让我们以新的方式看待环境和自然界。“营造的氛围能使我们对自然环境和生物多样性心存敬意”，她说道。