J. Biomedical Science and Engineering, 2009, 2, 155-157
Published Online June 2009 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/jbise
JBiSE
Research on the ultraweak photon emission from
anti-cancer plants
Ping Wu1, Xiang He1
1Dept. of Applied Physics, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing, 210016, China.
Received 8 February 2009; revised 21 March 2009; accepted 23 March 2009.
ABSTRACT
UPE (Ultraweak photon emission) is one kind of
a common phenomenon in biological organisms.
It contains a wealth of information of biological
functions. In this paper, single photon counting
system is used to measure UPE of some anti-
cancer herbal plants. For the p lants, the changes
of UPE under different water condition are stud-
ied and the varying laws of ultraweak photon
number with time are analysed. The results are
higher fit double exponential decay law.
Keywords: Ultraweak Photon Emission; Photon Count-
ing; Barbed Skullcap Herb; Pedate Pinallia Jackin-
thepulpit Rhizome; Cochinchnese Asparagus Root;
Fitting
1. INTRODUCTION
In 1920’s, A. G. Gurwitsch, a former Soviet Union’s
cell biologist, was the first to discover the phenomena
of the ultraweak photon emission from biological ob-
ject (UPE) during the period of the cell division of
onion root tip [1]. UPE was able to be carried on the
research until 1950’s because of the restrictions of the
experimental means. In 1951, B. L. Strehler, et al. [2]
observed the photon emission from green plants in-
duced by light, and this phenomenon is called “delayed
luminescence.” In 1955, the L. Coli group used the
high sensitivity photomultiplier, which just came out,
to detect the photon emission from the wheat, legumes
and corn at the germination process [3]. From 1960’s
to1970’s, the former Soviet Union scientists have re-
searched except on plant but also on animal tissue like
frog’s nerve and muscle, mouse’s liver and so on. They
discovered that UPE is different from ordinary biolu-
minescence, for example fluorescence and so on, but is
correla tive w i th b iolog ic al metab ol ism.
So far, many experimental results show that the pres-
ence of UPE in biological organisms including plants,
animals, etc. UPE is an intrinsic and spontaneous proc-
ess of biological organisms and is different from biolu-
minescence phenomena observed, for example, in fire-
flies or luminescent bacteria. UPE is not dependent on
any particular enzyme or protein. It is the reflection of
the general information of the biological function and
has inherence relations with the life processes such as
cellular metabolism, cell division, growth, death, muta-
tion and cell-to-cell transmission of information. So, the
ultraweak photons can transmit the information of bio-
logical objects and it is playing an increasingly impor-
tant role in the development of biological science.
About UPE mechanism now there is no conclusion.
There are two major kinds of explain separately in
chemistry and in physics. In chemistry, the main expla-
nation is “the mechanism of metabolize emission”,
which thinks that the oxidation of the unsaturated fatty
acid produce peroxide free radical. The peroxide in ex-
cited state can be form when peroxide free radical com-
pound, and then UPE will be generated when the perox-
ide withdraw from excited state [4]. In physics, F. A.
Popp, et al. put forward “the mechanism of coherent
emission” [5,6]. They think that UPE partly or wholly
originate from the highly coherent electromagnetic field
in biological system and the field is possibly the basis of
communication between living tissues. The F. A. Popp’s
research on the organisms of the light-induced delayed
luminescence indicate that the luminescence accord with
the law of hyperbolic attenuation. This is precisely the
important characteristic of coherent field [7]. But “the
mechanism of metabolize emission” and “the mecha-
nism of coherent emission” only can partially explain
some experimental results for UPE. This reflects the
complexity of UPE mechanism, as well as the limitation
which the people knew to it.
At present, the research on UPE also exist a lot of
important questions to be resolved, such as the mecha-
nism of producing UPE, the detection technology of
ultraweak photon and the interpretation information of
UPE and so on. In this paper, we detect the UPE from
some kind of anti-cancer plants by using photon count-

156 P. Wu et al. / J. Biomedical Science and Engineering 2 (2009) 155-157
SciRes Copyright © 2009 JBiSE
ing system, and analyze the time varying law of biologi-
cal photon counting.
2. EXPERIMENT SYSTEM AND MATERIAL
2.1. Experiment System
The output current signal of the photomultiplier tube is
characteristic of the natural discretization under the
weak light illumination. The single photon counting
system makes use of the characteristic and adopt the
technique of pulse height screening and digital counting,
so it has high sensitivity. It can detect the very weak
photon information whose intensity of the optical flow
lower than the thermal noise level (10-14W) of pho-
tomultiplier under room temperature, and it can be used
for the measure of UPE. The structure of the experiment
system is shown in Figure 1. In measurement, the sam-
pling interval is 3 minutes, the integral time is 1 minute.
2.2. Experimental Material
The leaves of anti-cancer plant including Barbed Skull-
cap Herb, Pedate Pinallia Jackinthepulpit Rhizome and
Cochinchnese Asparagus Root are chosen as the meas-
ured samples. The UPE of the samples at different
growth status have be measured by the single photon
counting system and the correlation curves of the bio-
logical photon counting with time are described.
3. MEASUREMENT RESULTS AND DIS-
CUSSION
3.1. Measurement Results for Different
Situations
The UPE of the leaves for three plants in the normal
implantation situation and the situation of stopping wa-
tering a few days are measured separately and the dif-
ferences of UPE under different conditions are evident.
The measuring curves and fitting curves for the photon
counting of the samples with time are shown in Figure
2-Figure 4.
Figure 1. Structure of experiment system.
(a) Measuring curves of UPE (b) Fitting curves with double exponential decay
Figure 2. Measuring curves and fitting curves of Barbed Skullcap Herb.
(a) Measuring curves of UPE (b) Fitting curves with double exponential decay
Figure 3. Measuring curves and fitting curves of Pedate Pinallia Jackinthepulpit Rhizome.
050100 150 200 250 300
400
800
1200
1600 1-Normal implantation
2-Stoppin g watering 5 days
3-Stoppin g watering 9 days
3
2
1
photon counting
time (min)
050100 150 200 250 300
400
800
1200
1600 1-Normal implantation
2-Stopping watering 5 days
3-Stopping watering 9 days
3
2
1
photon counting
time (min)
Photon counting
system
Computer control
system
Semiconductor
refrigeration
system
Photomultiplier
Photoelectricity
conversion
Signal collection
and processing
Sample room
050100 150 200 250 300
400
800
1200
1600 1-Normal implantation
2-Stopping watering 3 days
3-Stopping watering 5 days
3
2
1
photon counting
time (min)
050100 150 200 250 300
400
800
1200
1600 1-Normal implantation
2-Stopping watering 3 days
3-Stopping watering 5 days
3
2
1
photon counting
time(min)

P. Wu et al. / J. Biomedical Science and Engineering 2 (2009) 155-157 157
SciRes Copyright © 2009 JBiSE
050100 150 200 250 300
400
800
1200
1600
1-N ormal implantation
2-Stopping watering 5 days
3-Stopping watering 10 days
3
2
1
photon counting
time (m in )050100 150 200 250 300
400
800
1200
1600 1-Normal implantation
2-Stopping watering 5 days
3-Stopping watering 10 days
3
2
1
photon count ing
time (m in)
(a) Measuring curves of UPE (b) Fitting curves with double exponential decay
Figure 4. Measuring curves and fitting curves of Cochinchnese Asparagus Root.
Table 1. Fitting results of Barbed Skullcap Herb.
Double expo-
nential decay Exponential decay Gaussian function
Normal
implantation 0.97083 0.9187 0.90616
Stopping watering 5 days 0.96989 0.94243 0.93253
Stopping watering 9 days 0.95414 0.91233 0.90341
Table 2 . Fitting results of Pedate Pinallia Jackinthepulpit Rhizome.
Double expo-
nential decay Exponential decay Gaussian function
Normal im plantation 0.96815 0.88676 0.87291
Stopping watering 3 days 0.96843 0.92953 0.93457
Stopping watering 5 days 0.95613 0.93143 0.91942
Table 3. Fitting results of Cochinchnese Asparagus Root.
Double expo-
nential decay Exponential decay Gaussian function
Normal im plantation 0.9875 0.94895 0.9394
Stopping watering 5 days 0.98748 0.94 675 0.9352
Stopping watering 10 days 0.97057 0.93394 0.922
From the measurement results, it is clear that the in-
tensity of UPE from the samples display a marked de-
cline under the lacking water condition, an d the intensity
will further reduce along with the increase in the number
of lacking water days. This reflects the growth of plants
for water-dependent, in the lacking water condition, the
plants appeared th e decline of the internal functions.
Comparing of the fitting curves under the lack of wa-
ter in five days, it may be seen that the reduction of UPE
from Barbed Skullcap Herb slower than Pedate Pinallia
Jackinthepulpit Rhizome and Cochinchnese Asparagus
Root. This is related to their own growth habit. Barbed
Skullcap Herb has a certain water-retention capacity, and
its branches or leaves, which have been picked off and
exposed to the sun, can be survived after inserted into
moist soil. Pedate Pinallia Jackinthepulpit Rhizome and
Cochinchnese Asparagus Root are all delighted for moist,
so the lack of water is of more influences on them.
3.2. Emission Laws Discussion
In order to study the law of UPE from the samples, the
measured curves are respectively fitted with double ex-
ponential decay, exponential decay and Gaussian func-
tion. The results of three different fitting are shown in
Tables 1-3.
It is not difficult to see from the results in Tables 1-3,
the fitting of double exponential decay is the best of the
three, and it is different from the coherent theory that
thinks UPE accord with hyperbolic attenuation. So it
reflects that UPE is a very complex biological system,
not fully coherent mechanism but a variety of mecha-
nisms have a role in it. There have been some research
results shown that the dual-exponential decay law [8],
but is still very difficult to explain theoretically. One
view is that this is because there are a number of the
coherent system in biology and there are interaction be-
tween them. In order to reveal the nature of UPE, it is
required that a large amount of experimental and theo-
retical work to be done.
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