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Speaking with light

3 minutes

How beautiful bioluminescent bacteria can expose invisible water pollution

By journeying to the depths of the ocean to study bioluminescent sea creatures, Edie Widder, president of the Ocean Research and Conservation Association in Florida, has witnessed firsthand the strange, vibrant colours of deep-sea life. In a stroke of inventive inspiration, Widder has taken her work with bioluminescent life and applied it to the ongoing problem of invisible pollution, which is putting the world’s oceans and waterways in peril. A short documentary by the Academy Award-winning director Alex Gibney, Speaking With Light is a meditation on hidden problems, inventive solutions and beautifully simple science.

Director: Alex Gibney

Producer: Alexis Bloom

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Support Aeon

Become a Friend for $5 a month or Make a one-off donation

Become a Friend of Aeon or Make a donation

Aeon is a registered charity committed to the spread of knowledge. Our mission is to create a sanctuary online for serious thinking.
But we can’t do it without you.

Aeon is a registered charity committed to the spread of knowledge and a cosmopolitan worldview.
But we can’t do it without you.

Essay/
Evolution
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Living among humans favours fearless problem-solvers interested in new things. That's how city birds get smarter

Menno Schilthuizen

Essay/
History of Science
What is good science?

Demanding that a theory is falsifiable or observable, without any subtlety, will hold science back. We need madcap ideas

Adam Becker