Until now, the wing colors of many flies and wasps were dismissed as random iridescence. But they may be as distinctive and marvelous as the much-studied, much-celebrated wings of butterflies and beetles.
Wasp and fly wings are made from two compressed layers of transparent chitin, with light bouncing off both layers and mixing to produce color. The same is true of oil slicks and soap bubbles, and scientists considered transparent wing coloration “a soap bubble iridescence effect, with randomly changing colors flashing over the wing surface,” according to scientists.
Instead, the researchers found that surface variations in chitin filtered out the iridescence. Remaining colors proved to be stable, and were visible from almost any angle. They differed consistently between species and sex.
Generations of biologists seem to have missed this partly because they didn’t look for it, and partly because the colors are most evident against a dark background. Against a white background, they’re invisible — which is exactly how most entomologists study transparent wings.
Researchers think the coloration has specific functions, particularly for mating, just as it does in butterflies and beetles and other insects with better-appreciated markings.
The patterns will also help scientists distinguish between species difficult to differentiate in other ways. Already the researchers used transparent wing colors to identify three new species of wasp.
Read more in the original article here.
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