Coherent light scattering by blue feather barbs

Richard O. Prum (), Rodolfo H. Torres, Scott Williamson and Jan Dyck
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Richard O. Prum: Natural History Museum
Rodolfo H. Torres: Mathematics, University of Kansas
Scott Williamson: Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, and
Jan Dyck: Institute of Population Biology, Universitetsparken 15

Nature, 1998, vol. 396, issue 6706, 28-29

Abstract: Abstract The structural colours of avian feather barbs are created by the scattering of light from the spongy matrix of keratin and air in the medullary layer of the barbs1,5. However, the precise physical mechanism for the production of these colours is still controversial1,3,4,6. Here we use a two-dimensional (2D) Fourier analysis of the spatial variation in refractive index of the blue feather barbs of the plum-throated cotinga (Cotinga maynana, Cotingidae) to show that the colour is produced by constructive interference between light waves scattered coherently by the nanostructured keratin-air matrix of the barbs.

Date: 1998
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DOI: 10.1038/23838

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