Structural color and other electromagnetic effects in natural structures

MARINA INCHAUSSANDAGUE; DIANA CARINA SKIGIN

Bad Honnef

Seminario; 644 Wilhelm und Else Heraeus Seminar: Bio-inspired, Nano- and Microstructured Surfaces: New Functionality by Material and Structure; 2017

Wilhelm und Else Heraeus Foundation

In this talk we will first give an overview of the different topics related to natural photonic structures that are being developed in our group at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, which include i) the analysis of the pointillistic colour effect found in the Myxomycete Diachea Leucupoda [1], ii) the study of the metallic appearance produced by multilayer interference in the beetles Ceroglossus suturalis [2], iii) the mechanisms of colour generation in the feathers of the Swallow Tanager bird species, and iv) the investigation of the UV protection provided by the corrugated pellicle in Euglenoids (microalgae) [3]. In the second part of the talk we will focus on topics iii) and iv). We will give details on the characterization of the species, paying particular attention to the most relevant features in connection to the investigated phenomena. The idealized models and the methods applied to solve the scattering problem by the microstructures under study will be explained. Far and near field results will be shown and discussed.References[1] A. Dolinko et al., Opt. Express 20, 15139 (2012)[2] A. Luna et al., Opt. Express 21, 19189 (2013)[3] M. Inchaussandague et al., Proc. SPIE Vol. 9429 (9 pages) (2015)