Flying Squirrel Uv Light. A flying squirrel caught in a flash of uv light shows up bubblegum pink. Access to museum collection at the minnesota science museum and the field museum of natural history in chicago allowed the team to investigate 100 specimens ranging across numerous states.
Fluorescence of visible wavelengths under ultraviolet (uv) light has been previously detected in a wide range of birds, reptiles, and amphibians and a few marsupial mammals.
Pink fluorescence. martin recruited the help of undergraduate student allie kohler—now a graduate student at texas a&m out of 135 museum squirrel specimens studied, the team found only members of the glaucomys genus—new world flying squirrels—glimmered. The type of lights and spectrum matter as well when. The flying squirrel does not actually fly, but sometimes appears to be doing so when it glides from tree to tree by means of a thin skin extending between its legs. When exposed to ultraviolet light (aka uv light), the sleek brown pelts of platypuses fluoresce a vivid bluish green—one of the few known mammal species the team chose platypuses as an example of a very different mammal from the flying squirrels.