A vocabulary of landscape — a landscape of words
1068 entries
bioluminescence
Light made by a living thing, from a chemical reaction rather than heat — a light-emitting molecule (generically, a luciferin) oxidized with the help of an enzyme (a luciferase), giving off a photon and almost no warmth. Fireflies, glow-worms, fungi, and a very large share of everything living in the open ocean below the reach of daylight.
Etymology
A compound assembled from two languages: Greek bios, life, plus Latin lumen, light, plus -escence, a suffix meaning becoming or beginning. The reagents are named with a straight face — luciferin and luciferase come from Latin lucifer, light-bearer, which was the name of the morning star long before it was the name of anybody else.
Notes
Roughly three-quarters of the animals sampled in the open ocean can make light, which makes bioluminescence the ordinary condition of life on this planet by count, and daylight vision the specialty. Uses include lures, counter-illumination that erases an animal’s silhouette from below, startle flashes, and burglar-alarm displays that light up a predator for something larger to notice.