Description

Real Peacock Feathers For Sale

Structural color strikes again! It’s a pattern in nature to produce bright iridescent color by structural interactions with photons of light (called photonics) rather than pigment. Different wavelengths of light are absorbed or reflected producing particular colors and diffracting like a prism to produce iridescence.  These Real Peacock Feathers For Sale colors are vibrant shimmering and rainbow-like, as seen in the peacock feather, butterfly scales, brightly colored fish, and gleaming insects.

The feather eye spot has many sub-feathers called barbs.  Each barb has individual barbules extending from the fine shafts.  To examine the internal structure, a razor blade was used to cut the barbules transversely.  The end of the barbule was examined in the SEM.  The outer structures contained rows of melanin photonic crystals.  Melanin is the brown pigment found in our skin that protects us from the sun and also protects animals. In the case of the peacock, the melanin granules create optical interference that produces color.  The curved structure of the barbules helps to diffuse the reflection, and the dark background the melanin pigment makes creates a more vivid interference color.