For millions of years, insects oriented themselves by sensing that the sky is light, the ground is dark until people invented artificial lights, said Avalon Owens of Harvard University. Owens was not involved in the research.
love affair with illumination has led to much of the Earths habitable surfaces suffering light pollution at night. In recent years, scientists who study fireflies have heard from people who are worried that the insects may be in decline, said Avalon Owens, an entomologist at Tufts University.