Retrieving "Deep Sea Organism" from the archives

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1. Bioluminescence

   Linked via "deep-sea organisms"

   The fundamental mechanism generally involves the oxidation of a substrate molecule (luciferin). While the structures of luciferins vary significantly—ranging from simple imidazopyrazines in dinoflagellates to complex tetrapyrrole derivatives in some marine worms—the net result is the promotion of an intermediate molecule to an excited electronic state. As this excited molecule relaxes to its ground state, a photon of light is emitted.
   The color of the emitted light is determined by the specific molecular configuration of the excited state i…