{"id":34645,"date":"2024-04-24T21:48:26","date_gmt":"2024-04-24T21:48:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/04\/24\/glowing-octocorals-have-been-around-for-at-least-540-million-years\/"},"modified":"2024-04-24T21:48:26","modified_gmt":"2024-04-24T21:48:26","slug":"glowing-octocorals-have-been-around-for-at-least-540-million-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/04\/24\/glowing-octocorals-have-been-around-for-at-least-540-million-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Glowing octocorals have been around for at least 540 million years"},"content":{"rendered":"
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More than half a billion years ago, the deep, dark ocean was aglow with the eerie light of bioluminescent corals, new genetic and fossil analyses suggest. The findings push the origins of bioluminescence<\/a> back by nearly 300 million years, researchers report April 24 in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B<\/em>.\u00a0<\/p>

\u201cOur study presents the oldest published record for the appearance of bioluminescence on Earth, and more than doubles the previous record for when bioluminescence first appeared,\u201d says Danielle DeLeo, an integrative biologist at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. The previous record, reported in 2022, was set by the 267-million-year-old ancestor of sea fireflies<\/a> \u2014 small, seed-shaped crustaceans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ability to produce light has evolved at least 100 times across the tree of life, in everything from fishes to corals to fungi<\/a> (SN: 4\/27\/17<\/em>). Chemical reactions generate the light, which can help the organisms hunt prey, attract mates or even hide from predators<\/a> (SN: 6\/7\/16<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DeLeo and colleagues wanted to understand how the trait developed in a coral subgroup called octocorals. These species \u2014 including soft corals, sea pens and sea fans \u2014 often live in the deep sea, have 8-fold symmetry and many are luminous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Colonial false gold coral (Savalia<\/em>) demonstrates its bioluminescence on a Bahamian reef. This form of bioluminescence in octocorals is the oldest yet dated.<\/span>S\u00f6nke Johnsen<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Analyzing the DNA of 185 octocoral species revealed genetic similarities that the team used to create an evolutionary tree, showing how the species are related to one another. Researchers then used octocoral fossils to estimate when lineages split into separate branches. Finally, based on when glowing species evolved and where in the tree they reside, the team calculated the probability of coral ancestors being bioluminescent.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt turns out the ancestor to all octocorals was bioluminescent,\u201d DeLeo says. That ancestral species lived roughly 540 million years ago, the team calculates.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n