Bird Feathers Model for New Printing Method.

• Position: TECHNOLOGY

In nature, colors play a vital role in behaviors such as pollination, signaling for mating, and defense against predators. Colors also are an important factor in scientific research that can provide the basis for novel printing and anti-counterfeiting applications.

Structural colors are those that are reflected when microscopic surfaces interfere with visible light. On the peacock, for instance, tail feathers have brown pigment, or melanin, but their microscopic structure makes them reflect the dazzling hues we typically see in these birds--blue, green, and turquoise. It is in this application that researchers from the University of Akron (Ohio), Northwestern University, Evanston, Ill., and Belgium's Ghent University are exploring.

Current printing technologies employ pigmentary colors, which are composed of toxic metal- or organic-based pigments that are susceptible to degradation and fading over time. The scientists have used a versatile technique to modify substrate surfaces that allows them to print colors on multiple...