In a transdisciplinary study, a research team led by IGB has developed insect-friendly street lighting and tested it in the Dark Sky Reserve Westhavelland as well as in three German municipalities. Tailored and shielded road lights make the light source almost invisible outside the illuminated area and significantly reduces the lethal attraction for flying insects in different environments. The researchers see this as an important technical solution to reduce insect mortality. The study was published in the journal Communications Biology. Road lights can become a trap for insects at night: Flying insects such as moths are attracted by the lights and drawn out of their habitats (vacuum cleaner effect). The disoriented insects often circle around the light sources until they die of exhaustion or are eaten. In order to test insect-friendly road lighting, road lights in a field experiment in the Westhavelland Dark Sky Reserve (AuBe project) and on roads in municipalities in Baden-Württemberg along three selected nature reserves in the Rhine-Neckar, Karlsruhe and Freudenstadt districts (NaturLicht project) were converted in a before-and-after experiment. The four sites were selected to represent a wide range of environmental conditions (urban, peri-urban, rural) and existing light pollution, and to cover a large area of Germany. .....