Posted on 08/01/2015 5:39:54 PM PDT by Talisker
As the sun went down after the 1862 Battle of Shiloh during the Civil War, some soldiers noticed that their wounds were glowing a faint blue. Many men waited on the rainy, muddy Tennessee battlefield for two days that April, until medics could treat them. Once they were taken to field hospitals, the troops with glowing wounds were more likely to survive their injuries — and to get better faster. Thus the mysterious blue light was dubbed “Angel’s Glow.”
In 2001, 17-year-old Civil War buff Bill Martin visited the Shiloh battlefield with his family and heard the legend of Angel’s Glow. His mom, Phyllis, happened to be a microbiologist who studied a soil bacterium called Photorhabdus luminescens or P. luminescens — which is bioluminescent, meaning it gives off its own light. In fact, it gave off a light that was pale blue in color.
Bill and his friend Jonathan Curtis wondered if this organism could be the source of Angel’s Glow. Bill’s mom encouraged them to try to find out.
The boys learned that P. luminescens live inside nematodes, tiny parasitic worms that burrow into insect larvae in the soil or on plants. Once rooted in the larvae, the nematodes vomit up the bacteria, which release chemicals that kill the host larvae and any other microorganisms living inside them.
Bill and Jonathan were slightly stumped to find out that P. luminescens can’t survive at normal human body temperature. But they figured out that sitting on the cold, wet ground for two days had lowered the wounded soldiers’ body temperature. So when the nematodes from the muddy soil got into the wounds, the bacteria had the right environment to thrive — and to save the men’s lives by cleaning out other, more dangerous germs.
How interesting!
The things you learn......
The commander of the 6th Florida was shot through the body at Shiloh. Before the war ended he had recovered and was back in command.
Interesting yes! Never heard of this bacterium before.
That’s a wild and interesting fact.
Thanks for the post Talisker. Apparently the therapeutic value wasn’t recognized during the war - I wonder if the bacteria has a medicinal use now?
New one to me. Thanks for the tidbit.
Wow
Bump to send to the Civil War buffs in the family.
One of the more profound and unforgettable displays at the Atlanta History Center is an array of the typical civil war field surgeon’s tools. One look at that and you wonder how anyone survived being treated for their wounds. Crude saws and other tools, and then to think they did not have developed germ theory and sterilization techniques. Eeew...
Neat! Thanks for posting.
I have visited re-enactment field hospitals for both the American revolution (Yorktown) and the Civil war (Ghettysburg).
By all accounts the Revolution, 85 years earlier, had better battlefield care.
Go Figure!
Ooops..misspelled Gettysburg! Sorry.
Fascinating! wonder if something like this could be useful for anti-biotic resistant infections??
I saw such a kit at the Museum and Library of Confederate History, Greenville, SC. It gave me the willies, and I was combat field medic in Vietnam.
Me neither. My great-great grandfather was a Confederate soldier at Shiloh, TN. (We’re Tennesseans.) - My parents used to take me to Shiloh when I was a child. - He told my grandmother that Shiloh was awful, just awful; the biggest mess that he had ever experienced in his life. - The Bloody Pond at Shiloh is now faded a lot; but when I was a child, it was still rather dark, dark crimson. I’m 69.
Hear her humming soft and low...
Poor Amanda does not know 'twas ended forty years ago...
In the hills of Shiloh.
Luv your moniker. I had some Talisker (whisky...that is the correct spelling by the way in Scotland)) on the Isle of Skye, Scotland. It has a sort of petroleum taste from the waters that filter through the peat bogs.
Ah, you drank the Water of Life in the Holy Land itself. You're a lucky man!
And that taste IS peat - not to much, and not too little. But juuuust right! LOL!
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