Butterflies firmly grasp the hearts of people in cultures of various languages with their beautiful appearance and erratic dance. Sometimes they tell the joy of "the orioles sing and butterflies dancing for a long time", and sometimes they show the sorrow of "the paper ashes fly into white butterflies".
In addition to placing feelings, butterflies also benefit us a lot in many aspects.
Butterfly Crossing the Mountain Gate
Some butterflies have beauty beyond the conventional.
Blue flash butterfly (Morpho menelaus), they are -, the thirty species of butterfly in the family Smooth butterfly. Its wingspan is about 12 cm, and its dorsal forewing and hind wings are bright iridescent blue, with black edges and brown ventral surfaces. The butterflies pass through the mountain gate, and under the sun, they are as beautiful as things on earth.
This look has caused a lot of trouble to the Blue Flash Butterfly. The unique blue color is considered to be of great value by collectors, so it was widely hunted in the 20th century.
In addition to secular pursuit, due to its unique microstructure, scientists have also focused their attention on its rainbow-colored wings, believing that this is a field worthy of research.
colorful blue
blue flash butterfly's wings are a classic case of iridescent blue coloring in the insect world.
The butterflies we usually see are caused by optical interference, but the iridescent blue of the blue flash butterfly - "colorful blue" is completely different: although the blue flash butterfly presents a dazzling blue color, it is just a visual effect, it has no pigment - everything is caused by the microstructure of the wings.
Production and maintenance of pigments is inherently expensive and requires a lot of energy. What should I do if I love beauty and don’t want to spend too much energy? What the blue flash butterfly presents to us is actually an alternative solution to color from the magical design of nature.
Scientists used SEM, scanning electron microscope and spectroscopy to learn more about its wings. When they discovered that the blue flash butterfly used a clever method to obtain its unique color without pigment: its bright blue light comes from scattered light, similar to the rainbow-colored soap bubbles that shine in the sun—the soap bubbles that are completely transparent in themselves.
The scales on their wings have a set of longitudinal ridges, and there are layers of thin flakes in the ridges - forming a Christmas tree-like structure that is responsible for the diffraction or bending of the light pattern of the wings.
This microstructure can only be seen with an ultra-high resolution microscope. Its size is the same as the wavelength of light and consists of alternating layers of chitin and air, each layer has its own refractive index. The reaction with visible light is therefore strong, resulting in a characteristic rainbow blue.
learn from them
biological engineering The world is paying more and more attention to understanding the wing structural components of blue flash butterflies, and wants to learn from them. The biological photon nanostructures in these scale ridges have potential applications in many aspects such as design equipment and sensors.
And we ordinary people can also benefit. For example, windows in future homes—change their color and scatter light according to the location of the sun.
This is not just a fancy thing. Through this way of imitating the blue flash butterfly, we can design glass windows that reflect excessive ultraviolet rays and reduce glare. Best of all, this can be done without hindering the line of sight, without requiring any shade or tinted coating.
written at the end
is naturally rich and naturally generous.
In the future, perhaps one of our development directions is the combination of technology and nature - building truly sustainable biological buildings that integrate them with nature and reversing the harm our traditional architectural technology has caused to the earth.
We can have silver pavement as shiny as desert silver ants, metallic but transparent windows like blue flash butterfly, or buildings that use the least material like the leaves of Monstera , etc.... There are many more brains, let's talk about it next time I have the chance.
Author thanks for your attention (- _-)
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