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Glow-in-the-dark houseplants shine in rainbow of colours
Succulents become rechargeable night lights after injection with tiny phosphor particles.
The researchers, led by Xuejie Zhang, a materials scientist at the South China Agricultural University in Guangzhou, describe today how they produced the plants in the journal Matter 1. Whereas genetically engineered bioluminescent plants are, so far, limited in the range of colours they emit, afterglow phosphors span a wide variety of hues, including red and blue, and they can be combined to produce a white glow. The luminescence — which the team generated in hues of blue-green, blue-violet, green, red and white — lasted as long as 120 minutes after exposing the plant to tailored wavelengths of light or sunlight, and could be triggered again and again over the 10 days of the study.
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