Public curiosity and interest in natural history boomed in the latter half of the 19th century, fuelled by scientific discoveries and a resurgence in the building of museums to house these new discoveries. Birds, mammals, reptiles and even fish could be easily stuffed and mounted, but what of creatures lacking an exoskeleton? What to do with soft-bodied sea animals such as jellyfish, anemones, squid and octopus?

Leopold Blaschka, glassmaker and amateur naturalist, solved the problem. He and his son Rudolf recreated these lifeforms in glass and supplied their glass creatures to museums throughout Europe and America. Interest in these glass models - both as design artefacts and as historical scientific records - has again boomed, and museums are returning their Blaschka collections to public display.

The latest Wellcome Trust TwoTen exhibition, 'The Glass Aquarium', features several exquisite Blaschka models (the Design Museum in London is hosting a larger exhibition of Blaschka pieces). These are complemented by the work of four contemporary artists, Christine Borland, Dorothy Cross, Mark Francis and Sophie Roët.

The conceptual and visual link between the glass models and the art is a small jellyfish, Aequorea victoria - one of the sea creatures represented in glass by the Blaschkas. In a neat twist, this limpid, undulating jellyfish has also made a major contribution to biomedical research. It is the source of the somewhat literally named 'green fluorescent protein' (GFP), which is widely used to visualise structures in living cells. GFP is also commonly used to show whether a gene has been successfully introduced into an organism.

The medical benefits flowing from the use of GFP are potentially enormous, though it is not just scientists who benefit from Aequorea victoria. GFP has even been employed by the Brazilian-born, Chicago-based conceptual artist Eduardo Kac, who calls himself the creator of 'Alba' - the green-glowing transgenic-rabbit-cum-artwork.

Christine Borland's work, 'The Aether Sea', was created after her research fellowship in the Medical Research Council's Social and Public Health Sciences Unit at Glasgow University. It is a beautiful film, a homage to a seemingly insignificant creature with a major impact.

Dorothy Cross's film, 'Come into the garden Maude', explores the forgotten life of amateur zoologist Maude Delap. Based on the remote island of Valentia off the west coast of Ireland, Delap immersed herself in the study of jellyfish. Her most extraordinary success was to rear jellyfish in belljars. Like Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka - whose glass models of sea creatures she would have seen in Dublin's Natural History Museum - Delap typified the pioneering spirit of the 19th-century amateur naturalist.

Though she corresponded regularly with the Dublin museum, she worked mostly on her own with no technical assistance. Despite her groundbreaking scientific work, Delap's story is largely forgotten. Using the landscapes and seascapes of Delap's home, and piecing together the known fragments of her life, Cross's film mixes material evidence with metaphor to draw connections between the world beneath the waves and the murky depths of memory.

A keen collector of natural history and scientific ephemera, the artist Mark Francis's substantial collection of scientific prints and illustrations reflect his fascination with the internal structure and workings of human, animal and plant life.

Francis has provided two prints by the publisher G Masson from his personal collection along with six prints from Jules César Savigny's Description De L'Égypte (published in 1824) - a collection of more than 800 natural history plates depicting animal, mineralogical and botanical specimens.

The work of naturalist Savigny was known to Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, and it is possible that the Blaschka glass sea creatures were influenced by these engravings and Masson.

Although direct inspiration for the wandering threads of Sophie Roëts delicate textile, 'Wandering Lines', came from histological images - of the minute structure of animal and plant tissues - the visible result is more akin to the watery habitat of Aequorea victoria.

Roët breaks the 'normal' rules of weaving by creating movement through unorthodox methods such as highly twisted yarns that crinkle in hot water or stainless steel yarns that are rigid yet flexible. Like the jellyfish that emits a rarely seen phosphorescence, Wandering Lines has a second self - an alter ego revealed only in the dark.

Thanks go to the National Museum and Gallery, Cardiff, and Nottingham City Museums and Galleries for lending their Blaschka collections to the TwoTen Gallery and Design Museum.

See also

• Press release (25 February 2002): Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka: The Glass Aquarium