bioluminescent phytoplankton (x-post from r/biology)

sonofarex · 7 months

I remember our Biology field trip in senior year to the Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre. It was a pretty amazing trip overall.

Our teacher was dedicated. He loved teaching and loved watching people learn. He fought tooth and nail to approve a trip to drive a bus full of high school kids 1292km (803 miles) to a marine research station so we could see up front what it was like to do research and live a life of science.

After the grueling trip there and a few days of boat tours and general sightseeing we were starting to wind down and prepare for the long trip home. On the second last night the teacher made it very clear that we were not to leave our lodgings under any circumstances. Other nights we were all but left alone in the evening, short of wandering off too far or getting into anything serious. We all assumed that someone had overstepped the boundaries and ruined the freedom for the rest of us. This was not the case

Around midnight he starts going around to each of our dorms and waking everyone up and asking them to come with him for a surprise. Not everyone went, and it was too fucking bad for them. We walked a ways down to the pier once everyone was gathered and ended up on a boat just on the edge of the ocean. We pushed off and went far enough out that the lights of the shore were barely visible. We stopped and dropped anchor and sat for a good 20 minutes while our teacher insisted that we just be silent and absorb our surroundings.

Then he said it was time for the surprise. His words were simple, "lean over the edge and run your hand through the water". Seemed silly, but at that point most of us were really in the moment. I wasn't the first to do it, but those who did immediately gasped in amazement. We all followed suit to experience it for ourselves.

It's hard to describe the sensation and the visualization of running your hand through dark water filled with bio luminescent plankton, but it's easy to say it was amazing. The water was cool and the air was damp and it almost seemed like you were reaching into a starry sky. There were long periods of silence and short bursts of amazement and discussion.

I'm not sure how long we sat there in that spot running our hands through the water but it felt like we were there all night. The feeling that I had that night has never been reproduced and the memory it created will never be forgotten. I will always remember not only that night but the immense jump in admiration and respect I felt for my teacher for bringing us out on that shitty old boat to witness something we'd never forget.

So in closing, fuck yeah biology and fuck yeah teachers who care

SourCreamWater · 7 months

Been surfing a few times after midnight during red tide. Pulling into a close out barrel that's glowing is FUCKING. RAD.

What isn't rad, is that you're out in the ocean after midnight and you can see every swimming bit of sea life but you don't know what it was. In other words, the stirring of the water is what makes it glow...so as a fish swims...you get to see it under you and hope it wasn't something lame. Sharks get hungry at night.

I was sailing with some friends to Catalina Island during red tide and it was pitch black with no wind so the ocean was like glass and we were using the motor. Dolphins came and swam next to our boat for almost a half hour making it glow. Pretty cool experience.

jaggazz · 7 months

This looks like the scene from Contact where she meets her "dad" on the beach.

Firebert010 · 7 months

Saw this in Mosquito Bay in Puerto Rico, a location known as one of the only isolated occurrences of this phenomenon. The plankton respond to physical stimulation, so every movement in the water becomes a million dazzling points of blue light. The photos show more of a blue glow, but to the eye it's perceived as countless individual spots. Fish in the water become lightning bolts. We had the fortune of seeing a ray glide by, it looked like a round UFO glowing in the water. Most amazing thing I've had the fortune to see in my life.

themooseiscool · 7 months

"Steve what produces this effect of illumination? Is there a chemical inside the organism?"

NexSacerdos · 7 months

When I was 14 I sailed between Tonga and Fiji in the middle of the Pacific on a 40' sailboat with some relatives who were sailing around the world. During the three day passage the moon was toward the new moon part of the cycle. I had the watch between 12 and 4 one night and the stars and bioluminescense were beyond imagining. The sky was an explosion of stars and galaxies, thousands of miles from any major city, and the boat carved a wake of stars in the water with thousands of points of light generated by these tiny creatures. It was like there were stars everywhere.

So I sat and marveled at it while listening to the Star Wars radio show on tape as the sailboat made is way silently through the stars.

Definately one the most beautiful experiences of my life.

larabar · 7 months

I was able to see this once. Is the phytoplankton on a schedule of some sort so I can know when to get out and enjoy it?

megablunt · 7 months

i once did acid at my friend's beach house, coincidentally this happened on the beach that night. i thought i was just seeing shit but then other people were seeing it too. took me about a week to figure out that it was actually this bioluminescense phenomenon. i recommend that everybody try unknowingly stumbling across this on a dark beach while tripping on acid

shoompdawoomp · 7 months

I saw this happen on a beach in Victoria BC without any prior knowledge of these phytoplankton my mind was blown

AintGotNoRhythm · 7 months

i love the whole world

BarnabyFuttock · 7 months

Awesome. Where is this? I saw a lot of this in Vietnam, it's seriously cool if you put on swimming goggles and swim through it so the specs fly past you - totes looks like you're travelling at lightspeed/an old screensaver

Creativation · 7 months

I've witnessed it in Mulege, Mexico as a boy. One of the more fun things to do was to take a handful of sand and throw it out into the water in a wide spread. Wherever the sand'd hit there'd be little flashes of blue light and it'd look like a machine gun fire spray into the water. Extremely cool!

LerithXanatos · 7 months

It's all nice until it's midnight, you're miles from the coast and the slightest movement of yourself lets all the sharks in the neighborhood know you're there and are an injured sea turtle.

pryalex · 7 months

Anyone knows where to get this picture in a better resolution?

littlefawn · 7 months

Dinoflagellates!

AerialAmphibian · 7 months

Tom Hanks as astronaut Jim Lovell in Apollo 13:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112384/quotes?qt=qt0476833

Television Reporter: Is there a specific instance in an airplane emergency when you can recall fear?

Jim Lovell: Uh well, I'll tell ya, I remember this one time - I'm in a Banshee at night in combat conditions, so there's no running lights on the carrier. It was the Shrangri-La, and we were in the Sea of Japan and my radar had jammed, and my homing signal was gone... because somebody in Japan was actually using the same frequency. And so it was - it was leading me away from where I was supposed to be. And I'm lookin' down at a big, black ocean, so I flip on my map light, and then suddenly: zap. Everything shorts out right there in my cockpit. All my instruments are gone. My lights are gone. And I can't even tell now what my altitude is. I know I'm running out of fuel, so I'm thinking about ditching in the ocean. And I, I look down there, and then in the darkness there's this uh, there's this green trail. It's like a long carpet that's just laid out right beneath me. And it was the algae, right? It was that phosphorescent stuff that gets churned up in the wake of a big ship. And it was - it was - it was leading me home. You know? If my cockpit lights hadn't shorted out, there's no way I'd ever been able to see that. So uh, you, uh, never know... what... what events are to transpire to get you home.

mwaetbt · 7 months

1994 me on starboard lookout in the Navy messing with the night vision goggles when we happened upon a giant mass of this stuff. I just about shit myself. haha

lcustard · 7 months

Had a chance to go swimming in the stuff in PR. It was seriously amazing and I highly recommend it, other then the part where thousands of the things get stuck in your swimsuit and slowly go dark as they die when you get out of the water.

pen154321 · 7 months

why has no one requested high res yet? WE NEED IT!

Ryugi · 7 months

Fucking magical. Anyone know when I can see this IRL next?

FriedChicken · 7 months

Is there a bigger version of this image available?

UnknownGnome1 · 7 months

I saw this in the Maldives. I went for a midnight stroll round the island and was utterly gob smacked by what I saw. I didn't go to sleep that night. This also has to be one of my most unforgettable experiences.

KrazyUnicyclist · 7 months

absolutly amazing

Roaning · 7 months

To quote Dan Brown's book that I can't remember the name of but quite enjoyed:

"A man would never lie about bioluminescent plankton"

XaulXan · 7 months

I swam in that stuff in the Outer Banks in North Carolina on night. Freaked me the fuck out thinking about have a bio luminescent dick

onemindoneplanet · 7 months

Good post. hah.

TheShadowCat · 7 months

That shits awesome. If you swim in it, it's like your whole body is glowing.

warrensomebody · 7 months

I was on the beach one night in Cabo San Lucas and and when we walked on the edge of the water our footprints glowed blue like this. Amazing.

mbafk · 7 months

There is a bay in the north of Jamaica where you can swim year round in luminescent plankton. Seeing yourself glow as you swim is an awesome experience.

We went this year after a wedding. More info: http://www.glisteningwaters.com/

thisismalarkey · 7 months

I first noticed this on the shore at night when i lived on the beach in Kailua. Oh, how I miss this..

stoictaco · 7 months

I saw this on the North Coast of Sydney Australia about 9 years ago. It was about midnight and pitch black on the beach, except the electric blue in the waves. Watching it with my friends was one of my favourite nights.

ape_ck · 7 months

I saw this about 8 years ago off the coast of Florida after a night of partying, I thought I was seeing stuff. It was badass watching the waves crash and light up.

Now I know, thanks.

rabidbasher · 7 months

I had the immense pleasure to be on a beach, while this glowing phytoplankton was in bloom, so to speak. Pretty awesome-- you could dig your fingers through the wet sand, and the plankton would leave a tracer-like glow in the wake.

connor_g · 7 months

I've gone kayaking in this stuff, it's mind blowingly amazing.

bwieland · 7 months

I feel like this might be photoshopped. From what I learned, the phytoplanton emit too small a light to be detected with a normal camera. Maybe this is a great camera, though.

rlyy28 · 7 months

This happened in Del Mar, California this past summer. Myself and about 10 of my closest friends swam in it at about 1 in the morning. naked. When one of us would piss our dicks would start glowing. Definitely one of the most incredible things I have ever seen.

xam217 · 7 months

does anyone have a larger picture of this?

ultrasupergenius · 7 months

I was camping at the beach in outer banks, North Carolina - and these guys were out in force. Unreal. It was incredible. You couldn't see more than 1/2 inch below the water when you were still... but as soon as you moved, the water would light up in this tron-like fashion... and sweeping your arm or leg through the water would send waves of light whirlpools spinning off. It was like swimming in a pool of energy.

[deleted] · 7 months

I experienced this once almost 10 years ago at the Belgian coastline of all places. We weren't very sober that night and were going closer to the water when we noticed the sand lighting up at each footstep, outlining our feet. So we had a great laugh, got naked and went swimming, tiny light kept appearing around us, they seem to react to movement for some reason. That's still one of the most magical nights of my life btw.

terrapurus · 7 months

Japan?

Killerboots1982 · 7 months

We have this where I live and it is awesome! When you run on the sand near the waters edge you leave glowing foot prints. You can actually grab handfuls of it and squeeze out glowing liquid. I use to night swim but that was before a kid had his arm bitten off by a shark. His uncle actually got the shark to shore and shot it with a ranger pistol and got the kids arm back like a boss. Pretty awesome uncle.

Stiltburga · 7 months

Avatar technology

mentoman87 · 7 months

i was in seaside OR, last summer and when me and my cousins walked down to the shore near midnight we were amazed to find this happening and it gave us a few hours of enjoyment. sadly the next day it did not happen. just wanted to share

BrizzleFizzle · 7 months

incubus - i wish you were here

wizard_2 · 7 months

Them sure are some fancy words thar, mister.

Lampmonster1 · 7 months

Anyone else feel a little bad for the ones that are gonna die on the beach?

tjb0607 · 7 months

I need a wallpaper sized version of this.

[deleted] · 7 months

They also look absolutely gorgeous under a microscope. Would try again, highly recommend. Seriously, the coolest geometric shapes...

Xenxe · 7 months

I have seen this on the San Juan islands in the Puget Sound in Washington. But it wasn't as obvious. The algae much more dim and green colored but still amazing to look at.

WholeWideWorld · 7 months

I was sea fishing with my dad a long time ago. We saw this without knowing what it was. There was a nuclear power station a few miles down the beach. I assumed the glow was from the radioactivity ಠ_ಠ

Sunslap · 7 months

This happens every year in my town, usually in the late summer/beginning of fall.

People often take their boats out and ride near the shoreline, causing huge blue glowing luminescent trails to appear everywhere.

It's quite the sight.

Indestructavincible · 7 months

Remember seeing just one of thes little guys on a beach in the Dominican. The fact we only saw one made us very confused as to what it was.

Now I know.

loosethread · 7 months

Give credit to the source: National Geographic

hernolaminar · 7 months

I had the pleasure of swimming amongst these this summer past. So amazing.

I_AM_THE_TOAST · 7 months

Any chance for a Hi-Res? Would make an awesome wallpaper

wasimalzin · 7 months

My desire to see it live.

lordsushi · 7 months

That happens pretty often on Wrightsville Beach, NC. On that beach, you don't see it until you walk on it. Then, each step sparkles for a split second. It's pretty cool! Many nights we would be out there jumping around like goons to make the "blue sparkly things" appear.

Mako_Eyes · 7 months

Don't you cuss me with yer sciency words, boy

Coosman · 7 months

This happens every once in a while down in San Diego. I had signed up for a nighttime kayaking trip around vacation island (near sea world) and was treated to glowing blue water every time I took a paddle stroke. I went down to the beach afterward and watching the glowing blue wave crash for an hour. Experience of a lifetime.

Inittornit · 7 months

Anyone else expect to see Jodie Foster's dead dad come walking up to her and tell her everything is going to be ok.

thoam · 7 months

I had the chance to go swimming through this in greece. It's amazing.

Quantumform · 7 months

There was a lake full of this stuff at my dad's old place. Whenever something would move in the water, it would glow bright green. Much like a glow stick! Obviously pulling the crab pot up was an awesome sight :)

TheUserNaim · 7 months

I went diving in that once (although the plankton i swam in was more yellowish). It was a night-dive, couldn't see the divemaster at all, had to follow his light-trails. Soooooooooo awesome.

-Gravitron- · 7 months

I used to live in Newport Beach CA and came across this one night not knowing what it was. Quite honestly one of the coolest natural things I've ever seen (two instances).

HopeRidesAlone · 7 months

Where is this? I just got back from Montezuma, Costa Rica.. and this looks identical to what we experienced on a beach at night. It was breathtaking.

kgenezk · 7 months

I went to Panama a few years back, and we could see those almost every night. It was amazing :)

thefuck1187 · 7 months

Bioluminescense is the most magical thing on the planet to me. Its what makes me love the earth we live on , not the people. I always wanted to be a biologist.

bedazzledfarts · 7 months

I went on a 5 day sailing ship in 7th grade and we would go swimming in the middle of the night. One night we jumped in and all the water around us started to glow. I'm now assuming it was bioluminescent phytoplankton.

onemindoneplanet · 7 months

That awkward moment when your repost gets more karma than my original post to r/pics...

Alot_Hunter · 7 months

PLANKTON.

KRABS.

Bazinga121 · 7 months

so i guess humans do spunk in the water...

tacotrucker · 7 months

Damn global warming.

SMG_07 · 7 months

oh god please tell me that you have a wallpaper sized picture of that ಠ_ಠ

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