"non-luminous" firefly: why glow dimly? eyes on the tail?

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25650142
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Ecology/Environment
• Research Institution: Nagoya University
• Principal Investigator: Oba Yuichi 名古屋大学, 生命農学研究科, 助教 (40332704)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): AOKI Setsuyuki 名古屋大学, 情報科学研究科, 准教授 (30283469)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 生物発光 / ホタル / 光受容

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We focused on the dim glow of the "non-luminous" fireflies, such as Lucidina biplagiata and Pyropyga sp. We expected that these species possess photoreceptor(s) on the lantern to detect their own dim glow, but molecular analyses did not strongly support the hypothesis. We think probably the expression level of the photoreceptor is very low, or another unknown photoreceptor gene is expressed.
Apart from the studies above mentioned, we performed transcriptomic analysis of nocturnal firefly, Luciola lateralis, and the results showed that possible photoreceptor gene is predominantly expressed in lantern. Same analysis can be applied to the "non-lumious" firefly species.

Free Research Field

発光生物学