title: Structural colors: from natural to artificial systems.
abstract: Structural coloration has attracted great interest from scientists and engineers in recent years, owing to fascination with various brilliant examples displayed in nature as well as to promising applications of bio-inspired functional photonic structures and materials. Much research has been done to reveal and emulate the physical mechanisms that underlie the structural colors found in nature. In this article, we review the fundamental physics of many natural structural colors displayed by living organisms as well as their bio-inspired artificial counterparts, with emphasis on their connections, tunability strategies, and proposed applications, which aim to maximize the technological benefits one could derive from these photonic nanostructures. WIREs Nanomed Nanobiotechnol 2016, 8:758-775. doi: 10.1002/wnan.1396 For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Yulan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Fu
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Physical Sciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Cary A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Tippets
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, The University of the South, Sewanee, TN, USA.
authors.forename: Eugenii U
authors.initials: EU
authors.lastname: Donev
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Rene
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Lopez
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D040761:Biomimetic Materials; D001709:Biotechnology; D001717:Birds; D004396:Coloring Agents; D005399:Fishes; D007313:Insecta; D053758:Nanoparticles / Q000737:chemistry / Q000648:ultrastructure; D036103:Nanotechnology; D055095:Optics and Photonics; D010858:Pigmentation; D010860:Pigments, Biological / Q000737:chemistry / Q000502:physiology; D012104:Reptiles
chemical_list: D004396:Coloring Agents; D010860:Pigments, Biological