We are banishing darkness from the night. Electric lights have
been shining over cities and towns around the world for a
century. But, increasingly, even rural areas glimmer through the
night, with mixed – and largely unstudied – impacts on wildlife.
Understanding these impacts is a crucial conservation challenge
and bats, as almost exclusively nocturnal animals, are ideal
subjects for exploring the effects of light pollution. Previous
studies have confirmed what many city dwellers have long noted:
some bats enjoy a positive impact of illumination by learning to
feed on insects attracted to streetlights. My research, however,
demonstrates for the first time an important downside:
artificial lighting can disrupt the commuting behavior of a
threatened bat species. This project, using a novel experimental
approach, was supported in part by BCI Student Research
Scholarships. Artificial lighting is a global phenomenon and the
amount of light pollution is growing rapidly, with a 24 percent
increase in England betwe