BACKGROUND Continuous exposure to light, even at relatively low intensities, leads to retinal damage and blindness in wild-type animals. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying constant-light-induced blindness are poorly understood. It has been presumed that the visual impairment resulting from long-term, continuous exposure to ambient light is a secondary consequence of the effects of lig...

Continuous irradiation of Mougeotia with linearly polarized green light (550 nanometers, 0.2 watt per square meter) induces a change in the orientation of its chloroplast from profile to face position, if the electrical vector of the green light is vibrating normal to the cell axis. This change is complete within 25 minutes of the onset of irradiation. In contrast, if the electrical vector of t...

Regular arrays of two-level emitters at distances smaller that the transition wavelength collectively scatter, absorb and emit photons. The strong inter-particle dipole coupling creates large energy shifts collective delocalized excitations, which generates a highly nonlinear response single few photon level. This should allow to implement nanoscale non-classical light sources via weak coherent...