Abstract
The brilliant blue luster of Morpho butterflies is produced by their scale that does not contain a blue pigment. The origin of the coloration can be attributed to an optical effect on a specific nano-structure, which can explain both of the high reflectivity and the mystery that the blue appears from wide angle despite an interference effect. We have successfully reproduced the Morpho-blue by fabricating nano-structure by extracting the principles of the coloration. The reproduced Morpho-type materials are expected to serve to various industrial applications. However, the process to fabricate the nano-structure spends too much time and cost using conventional lithography. To solve this problem, nano-imprint lithography was applied to fabricate the nano-structure. As a result, Morpho-color was replicated successfully in low cost and short time. Its optical properties were estimated by optical measurements, and found to show the basic characteristics of the original Morpho-blue.
