ABSTRACT
Bioluminescence is a chemiluminescence in which one of the participants is a protein and where the light emission serves a functional purpose for the organism in which the protein is found. Bioluminescence with bacterial luciferase, henceforth just referred to as luciferase, is obtained in a reaction with FMNH2 and a long-chain aliphatic aldehyde such as tetradecanal in an air-saturated solution. The rationale for many of the studies of bacterial bioluminescence as well as other bioluminescence systems is derived from the known mechanisms and concepts that have evolved in studies of chemiluminescence. An important step in the understanding of the mechanism of the bioluminescence would be the identification of the chemical structure of the fluorophore responsible for the bioluminescence from the reaction of luciferase alone. For a biophysical description of the bioluminescence mechanism, the first question to be posed is as to the identity of the light-emitting molecule.
