Insects are often drawn to artificial lights, creating a common sight, particularly at night. However, behind this behavior lies a fascinating historical story with insights into the subtle physical properties and natural processes of these creatures. Have you ever been curious why insects are so captivated by the glow of artificial lights?
Recently, an international team of scientists was led by Samuel Fabian, a research associate in the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial College London. He has given a reason for this which is going to surprise you. According to the scientist’s theory, ‘flying insects are attracted not because of the light of the light source but because of its heat.
This report from Michigan State University shows that insects are cold-blooded and our human body can generate heat on its own, which enables us to survive even in cold places. But cold-blooded insects are not able to generate this heat on their own and hence they go near the light source so that their body can get enough of it and they can survive even in a cold environment.
According to the new theory of scientists, scientists basically wanted to know that in the modern generation where light pollution has reached its peak, how are insects interacting with artificial light and what is the secret of the continuously decreasing numbers of these insects? For this, scientists took many different types of artificial lights and installed slow-motion cameras around them which could take many photographs within a second.
The result of this experiment revealed, that ‘Insects do not look towards the light source while circling it. They were not even giving any reaction due to the light source. Indeed, artificial light confuses the ability of insects to orient themselves to the horizon, disrupting their sense of up and down and causing them to fly in confused circles.
