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Backyard explorers discovered 15 new examples of glowing life 

A black light is all you need to glimpse an otherwise unseen world of biofluorescence

A glowing greenish-blue scorpion rests on the ground, which shines purple under ultraviolet light.

Scorpions, like many living creatures, are biofluorescent. To see them glow, all you need is an ultraviolet light.

Magnus Forsberg/500px Prime/Getty Images

By Meghan Rosen

This Halloween, it’s time to see scorpions, millipedes and other creepy crawlers in a new light. 

Using ultraviolet flashlights and light-filtering glasses, a group of community scientists is documenting flickers of fluorescence in these and other terrestrial creatures. Observations from around the world have illuminated at least 15 new examples of biofluorescence, biologist Courtney Whitcher and her colleagues report October 24 at bioRxiv.