WHILE RESEARCHING CORAL IN THE CAYMAN ISLANDS,
THIS MARINE BIOLOGY RESEARCH TEAM MADE AN ACCIDENTAL DISCOVERY...
IN THE FORM OF AN UNUSUAL PHOTO-BOMBER.
We had this idea to film, like, a large piece of a coral reef
and just take photograph, and photograph, and then stitch them together
to give an idea of what a nighttime fluorescent reef looks like.
We get back to the lab at night, and we're looking at the photos,
and there's this little eel, like, sitting in the photo.
And it was bright green.
We thought there was something wrong with the camera,
there was some problem with our gear.
Little did we know that the eel was real.
IT WAS SO UNEXPECTED THAT THIS EEL WOULD EXHIBIT BIOFLUORESCENCE
THAT THIS SINGLE PHOTOGRAPH LED DR. DAVID GRUBER TO ESTABLISH
A WHOLE NEW REALM OF RESEARCH ON LIFE UNDERWATER.
Luckily I was working with an ichthyologist, John Sparks at the American Museum of Natural History
and we set out on these voyages, this expedition around the world,
looking for different fluorescent fish.
AS OPPOSED TO BIOLUMINESCENCE, WHERE ORGANISMS PRODUCE THEIR OWN LIGHT
WITH CHEMICAL COMPOUNDS,
FLUORESCENCE IS THE PROCESS OF CONVERTING LIGHT TO OTHER WAVELENGTHS.
IT’S NORMALLY INVISIBLE, AND HAD MOSTLY BEEN OBSERVED IN CORAL,
AND SCIENTISTS WEREN’T COMPLETELY SURE WHY.
97% of hard corals have this ability to absorb the blue ocean light
and turn it into greens, turn it into oranges, turn it into reds.
Why is a coral doing this?
Is it acting as a sunscreen?
Is it a way for the corals to call in the symbiotic organisms to inhabit their microbiome?
COMMUNICATION IN AN UNDERWATER ENVIRONMENT IS COMPLEX,
WHERE LIGHT FOLLOWS A DIFFERENT SET OF RULES.
My blood wouldn't look red underwater.
It's because there's no red photons making it there.
Just imagine that scene: it's like being in a nightclub
where there's just blue lights on.
What would it mean for animal to just have one color light in its environment?
TO FIND OUT, DAVID AND HIS TEAM VENTURED INTO THE DEPTHS.
Our team goes down about 150 meters, using technical advanced mixed gases.
We then go out and scan the reef at night,
shining blue light on them, and we're looking to see who has the ability to absorb blue light
and send that back out as a different color.
What we came back with was just, like...
a bouquet of fluorescent fish.
We found it in blennies, we found it in eels.
We found it in stingrays...
and then we found it in sharks.
TO DATE, DAVID HAS DOCUMENTED OVER 180 SPECIES THAT EMIT THIS SECRET GLOW.
BUT THESE DISCOVERIES ONLY LED TO MORE QUESTIONS
ABOUT HOW THESE ANIMALS ARE USING THEIR SUPERPOWER.
In the eyes of these seahorse are these specific biofluorescent patterns.
Perhaps they're using this fluorescence as a way of marking and seeing each other.
They are the masters of camouflage.
It would make sense for them to blend in perfectly into the red fluorescence of the sea grass.
With Olindias, which is the flower hat jelly,
at the very tips are these green fluorescent pieces
that act as a lure, helping them feed.
One of the most interesting ones was the fluorescent swell shark.
The females have almost what looks like a mask, and these are really social animals
that hang out in small groups.
So, potentially this is a way for them to have secret little differences on sharks
that only the sharks can see.
This made me think, like, “How do I test this?
What are these sharks seeing?”
THE ANSWER WAS TO ASSEMBLE A TEAM OF NEUROSCIENTISTS, ICHTHYOLOGISTS,
EYE DOCTORS, AND ROBOTICISTS TO TAKE A DEEPER DIVE
INTO THE SHARKS’ VISUAL SYSTEM,
WHICH IS MUCH MORE SPECIFIC AND SENSITIVE THAN OUR OWN.
We designed a shark-eye camera.
When we looked at this shark, it has one visual pigment in its eye,
a rod that sees right at the blue-green interface.
But an incredibly sensitive rod,
meaning that it can likely see better in the dark,
about a hundred times better than a human.
According to our models, this is creating much more contrast for the sharks
than a non-fluorescent animal, or a non-fluorescent object.
Like seeing a Las Vegas nightlife scene from an airplane from far away, where patterns
on each shark say, "hey, this is who I am."
BUT BESIDES THE FUN OF EAVESDROPPING ON A SHARK’S NIGHTLIFE SCENE,
FLUORESCENCE RESEARCH HAS PROVEN SURPRISINGLY APPLICABLE
TO LIFE ABOVE THE SURFACE.
IN THE 1960s, A MOLECULE CALLED GREEN FLUORESCENT PROTEIN, OR GFP,
WAS ISOLATED FROM JELLYFISH.
IN THE DECADES SINCE, GFP HAS SINGLE-HANDEDLY TRANSFORMED BIOMEDICAL SCIENCE.
GFP was actually discovered by accident,
by a group of scientists that were interested
in the question of, "Why is this jellyfish glowing?"
They noticed that the pure bioluminescent machinery was blue.
But the animal in nature was giving off green light.
So, there was some protein in there
that was absorbing the blue light and turning it into green light,
and that was Green Fluorescent Protein.
THE CODE FOR GFP CAN SAFELY BE INSERTED INTO THE GENOME
OF ANY ORGANISM, CREATING A SIMPLE GLOW-IN-THE-DARK TAG,
AN UNPRECEDENTED TOOL TO TRACK EVERYTHING
FROM HOW CANCER CELLS AND INFECTIONS SPREAD
TO HOW DEVELOPING ORGANISMS MATURE.
We're such visual learners, and when we see something it causes a cascade of ideas.
The publications are just in the tens of thousands
of people that have made discoveries,
who have better understood life,
because this simple little molecule from a marine creature.
DAVID KNOWS THAT LEARNING FROM OUR UNDERWATER COUNTERPARTS
WILL HELP US SHED SOME LIGHT ON THE BIGGER PICTURE.
AND EXACTLY WHAT HE HOPES HIS DATA AND IMAGES WILL INSPIRE US TO DO.
Something like jellyfish have been around for 500 million years.
They are just these ancient, simple, yet sophisticated, yet beautiful animals,
and they can just jump through extinction events
like nobody's business.
But humans, we are incredibly sensitive,
and if we were to turn off the sun for 10, 20 years,
we don't have the capacity to survive that.
But other animals do.
It's almost like these ancient elders that are down there.
So, I think it's about learning from these other creatures, just about success.
About simplicity.
We emerged from the ocean, we have salty blood that runs through our veins,
and we are part fish.
So, really, my interest in the ocean is about better understanding us.
Better understanding where we fit in, where we fit among all the other species,
and where are we going?