Glow Fish
June 19, 2003 9:11 PM   Subscribe

Who wants a fish that glows in the dark? Coming soon to the US, fluorescent fish! I can finally get rid of my night light.
posted by Ron (11 comments total)
 
Bah, glowing fish. What I want is a glowing cat. Or maybe a potbellied pig with the glow genes just in it's nose, so it'd be like having a little mammalian flashlight. No need to worry about batteries.

Man, I can see endless possibilities for this. Oh the greed, the greeeeeeed!
posted by Watsonne at 9:18 PM on June 19, 2003


I would desperately like one of these. Also: does anyone know how they taste?

I love America! And Taiwan, too, I guess.
posted by mmcg at 9:59 PM on June 19, 2003


Pic
posted by magullo at 4:21 AM on June 20, 2003


Sorry to piss in your aquarium, but "fluorescent" is not the same as "bioluminescent".

To make your fluorescent pet glow in the dark, you need a backlight fixture.

Wake me up when someone genegineers a bioluminescent animal that glows by itself.
posted by titboy at 6:15 AM on June 20, 2003


backlight?! I meant "BLACKlight.

danm tyops
posted by titboy at 6:16 AM on June 20, 2003


It doesn't take a blacklight, they "glow" in dim light, just as the algae churned up by ocean liners fluoresce in the moonlight. Most "glow-in-the-dark" products are fluorescent which means, by definition, that they absorb energy and give it off, usually in the form of visible spectrum light, so actually, yes, fluorescent and bioluminescent are pretty much the same thing, just that bioluminescent is the fancy way to say fluorescence from life forms.
posted by Pollomacho at 6:30 AM on June 20, 2003


fluorescent and bioluminescent are pretty much the same thing, just that bioluminescent is the fancy way to say fluorescence from life forms.

Not exactly: fluorescence is the property of radiating low levels of light after being exposed to light. Bioluminescence, however, is the characteristic of fireflies and anglerfish, etc. that actually allows them to actually generate their own light via a chemical reaction.

</sciencecop>
posted by vraxoin at 6:50 AM on June 20, 2003


fluorescence is the property of radiating low levels of light after being exposed to light

...after being exposed to energy, energy! This could be heat energy from something like a volcanic vent, food energy from what you ate as a larva, or absorbed sunlight. Energy and matter are neither created nor destroyed, only converted from one form to an other.
posted by Pollomacho at 7:24 AM on June 20, 2003


I love you guys.
posted by emyd at 8:30 AM on June 20, 2003


You're actually talking about two different things here. One is bioluminescence, which is a process by which special chemicals in the animal's body are rapidly oxidized, producing light. The other is fluorescence, in which other kinds of special chemicals absorb light photons, which kicks their electrons up to higher energy states, which electrons then slowly fall back down to previous energy states, releasing photons of different wavelengths. The latter requires an external light source in order to work, whereas the former does not.

Hence, bioluminescent GM fish would kick the asses of fluorescent GM fish. That's all I'm sayin'.
posted by vraxoin at 8:50 AM on June 20, 2003


Hey hey
Ho Ho
GMO has got to go

Why do we need this stuff? Couldn't a bit more time and energy (not to mention money) be spent figuring out how to, say, repopulate our over-fished planet's waterways than creating a living consumer trinket?
posted by Ogre Lawless at 3:17 PM on June 23, 2003


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