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It opens up a whole new field of science," says Gruber.Įven more tantalizing than how they glow is why. "We're uncovering a secret world that some marine creatures have been tuned in to for millions of years, but we're just now beginning to notice. (See " Pictures: Fish Light Up in Neon Colors.") Using this setup, he has captured a vibrant spectacle of fluorescent red, green, and orange patterns on sharks, eels, seahorses, and more. So to "see" like a fish, Gruber uses a yellow filter on his camera that mimics the lens in a fish's eye. Many fish, it turns out, have just such yellowish filters in the lenses of their eyes.īut people don't. But to see those fluorescent hues, an animal needs a yellow filter to block out the overwhelming blue. Special proteins in biofluorescent species absorb that blue light and transform it into vivid greens, oranges, and reds. That's because water quickly absorbs most colors of light except blue. Underwater, the world looks mostly blue to human eyes. To reveal this underwater world, Gruber set out to photograph the ocean as it would appear to fish. "Most are shy, reclusive fish that stay tucked away, but we also identified several sharks that are brilliantly fluorescent," he says. Two more South Pacific expeditions revealed more than 200 biofluorescent species. "It's a whole new way for us to perceive, and better understand, life in the sea." "There's a hidden layer of pattern and color that humans are just tuning in to," Gruber says. For perhaps millions of years, these creatures have signaled each other in this secret language of light. Only animals with special filters in their eyes are privy to the neon light show, including many fish. These creatures, it turns out, can see each other glowing-green, red, or orange-while human eyes can't detect their fluorescence. They succeeded, and found 20 other species also with fluorescent displays, including a stingray. Gruber and his team set out to find the little green mystery in the wild. We'd never seen anything like it," says Gruber, a research associate at the museum and a marine biologist at the City University of New York. "It was so extremely fluorescent it didn't seem real. But in one image, a small, bright green eel pierced the darkness. While designing an exhibit for New York City's American Museum of Natural History, Gruber made hundreds of photographs of the same coral reef by day and by night to capture its fluorescent glow, a phenomenon common for those varieties of coral. That's why when he's on land, Gruber designs technology to revolutionize ocean exploration, such as special photography equipment to capture fluorescent light that the human eye can't normally see.Īn accidental discovery set his research in motion.
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Some of these unusual animals, he thinks, might hold keys to medical breakthroughs.īut first we have to identify them. Gruber's work offers another reason to save ocean life that we are just beginning to appreciate and understand. It's an underwater display that had never been seen before.Īnd it's not just beautiful. His expeditions have turned up hundreds of shimmering creatures, all showing off for one another with a mysterious fluorescence. Editor's Note: David Gruber is one of National Geographic's 2014 Emerging Explorers, a program that honors tomorrow's visionaries-those making discoveries, making a difference, and inspiring people to care about the planet.ĭavid Gruber found a secret world under the sea-and it glows.