Science Fair Research Paper

Science Fair Research Paper

Moths are flying around everywhere. They fly around all different types of lights, such as street lights, porch lights, and even traffic lights. Have you ever wondered why? There are many different theories to why moths are attracted to light, and all of them are from a different point of view.

Some moth theories are based off of energy, scientist say that moths are attracted to the light energy that the light produces. This causes them to go to the brightest light since it is giving off more energy. Have you ever thought about whether different color lights give off the same amount of energy? Will the moth be more attracted to the brightest light or both since they have the same energy? This is why other scientist have different theories to why moths are attracted to light.

Another theory to why moths are attracted to light is because moths are positively phototactic. Phototaxis is an organism’s automatic movement toward or away from light. An example of a negatively phototactic animal is a worm because it is not attracted to light and will avoid light in any way if possible. Since moths are positively phototactic insects they will always be attracted to light.

Lepidopterists, which are moth/butterfly scientist, believe that the moon plays a role in a moth’s navigation system and that light interferes. This confuses them because the moths don’t expect to get to the moon or above it, so this disorientates them. The one problem with this theory is that some scientist don’t believe that the moths realize how far away the moon is away from earth.

Moths are mainly attracted to ultra-violet light such as a bug zapper. This can cause them to be attracted to porch lights at a house, since the lights are ultra-violet to light up your house. This theory has nothing to do with energy or the phototaxis of the moth, so as simply as this theory is, it is the most common and reliable.

UV lights are invisible to humans but moths and other insects can see it. This is another reason why moths are more attracted to UV lights since they can see them. Moths also cannot see yellow lights because the wavelength for a yellow light is not visible to moths, which is also another reason why they like UV lights, because they are the same.

In conclusion, which theory do you believe is correct? All of them have true facts about energy, UV lights, wavelengths, and phototactic, but they all are from a different point of view which pose different opinions and facts to back it up.