Are insects drawn to light? New research shows it's confusion, not fatal attraction
ABC News
Many scientists have long assumed that moths and other flying insects were simply drawn to bright lights
WASHINGTON -- Like a moth to flame, many scientists and poets have long assumed that flying insects were simply, inexorably drawn to bright lights.
But that's not exactly what's going on, a new study suggests.
Rather than being attracted to light, researchers believe that artificial lights at night may actually scramble flying insects' innate navigational systems, causing them to flutter in confusion around porch lamps, street lights and other artificial beacons.
“Insects have a navigational problem,” said Tyson Hedrick, a biologist at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, who was not involved in the research. “They're accustomed to using light as a cue to know which way is up.”
Insects do not fly directly toward a light source, but actually “tilt their backs toward the light,” said Sam Fabian, an Imperial College London entomologist and co-author of the study published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications.
