Novel mass printing material developed

Have you ever wondered how a peacock's tail shimmers with brilliant blues and greens, or why a butterfly's wings flash colors that never fade? These are not paints or dyes, but "structural colors" — hues created entirely by microscopic structures that trap, bend and scatter light.

For years, scientists have tried to copy nature's approach to create vivid, long-lasting colors for uses that range from anti-counterfeiting labels to flexible displays. Now, researchers have taken a major step forward by developing a new type of optical metamaterial that gives them more precise control over microscopic structures, along with a production method that is as fast and inexpensive as printing a newspaper. Their findings were published in the journal Nature on April 22.

An optical metamaterial is a man-made material engineered to control light in unusual ways. Instead of relying on the natural properties of ordinary materials, scientists build tiny patterns smaller than a human hair that can bend, reflect and guide light with extreme precision.