Magic in a bottle

Mar 07, 2019 • 10:55 PM UTC

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Manu Prakash

I am a faculty at Stanford and run the Prakash Lab at Department of Bioengineering at Stanford University. Foldscope community is at the heart of our Frugal Science movement - and I can not tell you how proud I am of this community and grassroots movement. Find our work here: http://prakashlab.stanford.edu

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In rushing through life; we often forget to see how strange and wonderful and magical our world actually is. With videos and photo capturing technologies – some of that magic can be shared. But it can not always be experienced the same way when you hold it in your hand.
Today is one such example – I am Foldscoping some amazing dinoflagellates tonight (lots of data coming soon) – but I wanted to share this video before anything. Here is a flask of “single cell” – I shake the flask and boom – almost like a light bulb – the whole flask glows. I stop, and it’s pitch dark again. I shake again, and just like a flick of a switch – it glows as if no tomorrow. This is pyrocistis noctiluca. In the next few posts, I will share the microscopic view of this beautiful organism – but right now, I want you to enjoy and just look at this dreamy creature that decided to glow when shaken! Seeing this with your own eyes is beyond words – I wonder why our ancestors believed in strange stories – they were just discovering science.