Light Output

Increasing Light Emission

• [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12234677 Paper on isolation of G-LRE and H-LRE, which lists previous attempts to improve light production]
• [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10036167 Intensified light emission in presence of low ATP concentration by PPDK]
• [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1332531 Enhanced luciferase activity through cytodine nucleotides]
• [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12044905 Gene chimerisation to improve practical usefulness of firefly luciferase]
• [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17540326 Genetically modified firefly luciferase - the EPIC luciferase]
• [http://www.springerlink.com/content/76q433v347503k17/ Bioluminescence Spectra of Native and Mutant Firefly Luciferases as a Function of pH]

Relevant Physics

• The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candela Candela] measures how much light perceivable to the human eye is being emitted by a source of radiation, the Luminous Intensity (or luminous flux. It is related to [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radient_intensity Radiant intensity] (or radiant flux) (which is measured in watts per steradian) but has been weighted by a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminosity_function Luminosity function]. This alters the power output so that it is proportional to the sensitivity of the human eye: [http://en.wikipedia.or/wiki/Candela#Explanation Definition] of the candela with respect to Radiant intensity. Therefore, an object which is black may be emitting a lot of radiation (measured in watts per steradian) but since it is not perceivable to the human eye it is emitting 0cd of radiation.
• The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumen_%28unit%29 lumen] is simply cd*sr. It is thus the analogue to the Watt

• The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lux Lux] measures how much light is incident on a suface, the Illuminance. It is related to irradiance (measured in Watts per m^2) but has been weighted again by the luminosity function. 1lux=1cd/m^2
• The luminance of an object is how much light is emitted from it. This is also measured in Lux, but it is different contextually.

• A table of ambient illuminances. For our glowing bacteria to be seen from a given distance, they must be at least 1/20th of this value.

• A brief [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candela#SI_photometric_light_units summary] of the different luminous measures

• A [http://cvision.ucsd.edu/lumindex.htm site] containing luminosity functions

• To summarise, the luminosity function allows one to convert between radiant energy and luminous (i.e., visible) energy.

Difficulties

Inclusion Bodies

Human Vision