I once investigated it for a company. I found that Luciferase uses 1 ATP molecule for one photon. I calculated that I'd need kilo's of ATP per day for a 200 lumen lamp. We stopped the project soon after (we also looked at closed ecosystems etc).
But maybe, with large surfaces, in situations where you only need very little light, It might work. A closed glass container though, I wonder, will it remain efficient? I think closed ecosystem haven't been that successful right?
Could you add some detail to your comment - I believe it's missing some biological nuance.
Specifically: sure, it you wanted to feed a pile of ATP to some luciferase to output photons. But that's missing the point that ATP gets (near) infinitely restored from ADP. If glucose is your energy source, that cuts your mass needs by ~50x ( C6=180g/mol, ATP=241g/mol, 36ATP per C6).
Good remark but we were thinking of luciferase outside the cellular context. Keeping cells alive is a very big challenge. But arguable keeping “naked” luciferase functional is as well…
For cells you need a lot more than just glucose, you needs some medium and fetal bovine serum and you need a way to remove waste and dead cells, etc.
But maybe, with large surfaces, in situations where you only need very little light, It might work. A closed glass container though, I wonder, will it remain efficient? I think closed ecosystem haven't been that successful right?