The Bermuda Fireworm 'Odontosyllis enopla' is tiny and elusive – yet it might hold the secret to curing cancer and other diseases.

An expert on fireworms and other bioluminescent organisms, Dimitri Deheyn of the University of California at San Diego (UCSD), will be giving a lecture this evening at the Bermuda Institute for Ocean Sciences (BIOS).

The talk is part of the ongoing BIOS Distinguished Lecture Series. His speech is titled 'How Bioluminescence in Marine Organisms assists in biomedicine, biotechnology and acts as an environmental quality biomarker'.

"I study animals that produce light," Dr. Deheyn told The Royal Gazette in a telephone interview. "These include Bermuda Fireworms, but also certain types of starfish and fireflies."

Dr. Deheyn is a project scientist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UCSD where he studies ecotoxicology and environmental quality assessment.

The topic of bioluminescence in sea life is of great interest in the scientific community. This year three scientists, Osamu Shimomura, Martin Chalfie and Roger Tsien won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the discovery and development of the green fluorescent protein (GFP) found in jellyfish.

"The application of light is actually highly regarded in biotechnology, mainly because light is something easy to measure or quantify," said Dr. Deheyn.

During his lecture, Dr. Deheyn will review some of the uses of this biological light in molecular biology, where light production can serve as a bioreporter for cell activity, allowing us, for example, to localise diseases in the human body.

"Using light in medicine is popular because you can target and label diseases in the body that actually light up," he said. "You can target cancer cells or infections. For molecular biology we use light as a way to track down specific compounds we are interested in studying."

Using special instruments, doctors could measure the amount of light coming from particular cells to identify the disease. "You could also use light for telling whether the environment is polluted or not," said Dr. Deheyn. "The starfish that is happy produces a very intense light. If the starfish is not happy because there is something toxic in the environment (the light) will be shut down."

He likened it to the Steven Spielberg character 'ET'.

"When he was feeling well his finger glowed," said Dr. Deheyn. "But when he was sick his finger didn't glow and he couldn't communicate. This is exactly the same concept."

Dr. Deheyn is originally from Belgium. He studied starfish that produce light as part of his PhD thesis. "I was trying to understand how they do it," he said. "As opposed to the worm who uses light to attract a partner, the starfish uses light to scare away predators."

This time around Dr. Deheyn is just in Bermuda for the lecture, but he plans to return to research the Bermuda Fireworm.

"The Bermuda Fireworm is tropical, and is associated with warm water," said Dr. Deheyn. "The Japanese have their own species, and there is one seen in San Diego, California. I think they eat them in the South Pacific."

Dr. Deheyn explained that the Bermuda Fireworm glow is part of a mating ritual.

It is a signal from the female worm to attract males.

"It happens mainly in the summer, 30 minutes after sunset, at the first and last quarter of the moon," he said.

"The worms live on the bottom of the sea. The female will swim towards the surface and will release a kind of mucous that is glowing. You will have a puff of light like a firework, but underwater. That mucous will be lit up for five, 10 to 20 seconds.

"During this time the male has to be fast enough to note the signal and swim to the surface to meet the female and reproduce."

He said that for bioluminescent organisms, particularly those that are coastal, light pollution could be a real problem.

"If the Bermuda Fireworm male can't distinguish the glow from a lamp post on the beach and the glow from the female, it might be a problem. In many places, if you want to preserve these kind of animals you have to make sure you limit the light function. You do not allow light in those places, or you only allow light at certain times of the night and then you shut off everything."

Dr. Deheyn said so far the organisms that he studies are not endangered, at least not that anyone knows.

"Many of these species are still not well studied," he said. "But most importantly, they don't have any commercial application yet. A lot of the luminescent species are from the deep sea. We collect them every now and then, but what they do and how many are there is still not well known."

He said he hasn't yet had any success reproducing Bermuda Fireworms in the laboratory.

"With the Bermuda Fireworm in San Diego, that didn't work well," he said. "This animal is so well-tuned with the environment. You need a decrease of light and a particular moon phase. You need to have all those parameters that are difficult to recreate in the lab."

He is currently trying to establish what chemical causes the Bermuda Fireworm to glow.

"I have an idea which is the protein that produces the light," he said. "The next step isn't working on the worm, but building the protein. I am becoming independent from the animal itself."

The lecture will be at 7 p.m. in Hanson Hall at BIOS in Ferry Reach. There will be a cash bar at 6.30 p.m. The lecture is $15. Please RSVP to Vanessa Shorto, vanessa.shorto@bios.edu">vanessa.shorto@bios.edu or 297-1880 ext. 204. Discounts may apply if you are a member, please inquire when you RSVP.