Eco-friendly garden design can save you money on landscaping.
19.08.2024 - 10:26 / theunconventionalgardener.com / guest
Header image: A greenhouse filled with petunias engineered to glow continuously by the biotech start-up Light Bio. Image credit: LIGHT BIO INC.
I bought a glowing plant. It led me down a rabbit hole of radiant mushrooms, 19th century experiments and a modern rivalry between scientists in Russia and the Americas.
By Rachel Ehrenberg 08.12.2024
Petunias have never done much for me. If you had told me that one day, I’d fork over more than $50 for a single petunia plant, my eyes would have rolled out of my head. But this plant was special. This petunia glowed in the dark.
My plant was one of 50,000 shipped around the United States in April by the Idaho-based biotech start-up Light Bio. Called the “Firefly” petunia, it contains genes from bioluminescent mushrooms that make it constantly glow. A news release announcing the petunia’s arrival included a photo of a woman gazing serenely at a mass of flowers lit up like oversized glow-in-the-dark stars.
Well, that’s a neat trick, I thought.
I also wondered whether the Firefly petunia was more than just a trick. Though it seemed inconsequential, perhaps there was some implication I hadn’t thought of. At the very least, the plant might make me — a great admirer of plants (but a bit of a botanical snob) — think differently about petunias, those go-to ornamentals for gas stations and mansions alike.
I decided to learn more. So I paid my $53 ($29 for the plant, $24 for shipping) and placed an order.
Bioluminescence is the emission of light by living things. It is generated by a chemical reaction within the organism (unlike the phosphorescence of glow-in-the-dark stickers, which need to be charged up with light before emitting it). Bioluminescence is widespread, especially in the oceans: There
Eco-friendly garden design can save you money on landscaping.
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