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Journal article
Dynamic Color Regulation of the Lycaenid Butterfly Wing Scales
Journal of Bionics Engineering, Vol.21, pp.2395-2408
2024
Abstract
Butterfly coloration originates from the finely structured scales grown on the underlying wing cuticle. Most researchers who study butterfly scales are focused on the static optic properties of cover scales, with few works referring to dynamic optical properties of the scales. Here, the dynamic coloration effect of the multiple scales was studied based on the measurements of varying-angle reflection and the characterization of scale flexibility in two species of Lycaenid, Plebejus argyrognomon with violet wings and Polyommatus erotides with blue wings. We explored the angle-dependent color changeability and the color-mediating efficiency of wing scales. It was found that the three main kinds of flexible scales (cover, ground and androconia scales) were asynchronously bent during wing rotation, which caused the discoloration effect. The three layers of composite scales broaden the light signal when compared to the single scale, which may be of great significance to the recognition of insects. Specifically, the androconia scales were shown to strongly contribute to the overall wing coloration. The cover scale coloration was ascribed to the coherence scattering resulted from the short-range order at intermediate spatial frequencies from the 2D Fourier power spectra. Our findings are expected to deepen the understanding of the complex characteristics of biological coloration and to provide new inspirations for the fabrication of biomimetic flexible discoloration materials.
Details
- Title
- Dynamic Color Regulation of the Lycaenid Butterfly Wing Scales
- Authors
- Mingxia Sun - Tianjin Normal UniversityWeihao Meng - Technical Institute of Physics and ChemistryHaiwei Yin - Shanghai Ideaoptics CorporationLingjie Fan - Fudan UniversityLei Shi - Fudan UniversityGregory S. Watson - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science, Technology and EngineeringJolanta A. Watson - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, School of Science, Technology and EngineeringJingxia Wang (Corresponding Author) - Technical Institute of Physics and ChemistryLei JiangAiping Liang (Corresponding Author) - Tianjin Normal University
- Publication details
- Journal of Bionics Engineering, Vol.21, pp.2395-2408
- Publisher
- Kexue Chubanshe, Science Press
- Date published
- 2024
- DOI
- 10.1007/s42235-024-00560-0
- ISSN
- 2543-2141; 1672-6529
- Copyright note
- This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
- Data Availability
- All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article.
- Grant note
- This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant nos. 31772513 to MXS and 32070470 to APL).
- Organisation Unit
- School of Science, Technology and Engineering
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 991046398002621
- Output Type
- Journal article
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