Page 72 - Allah's Artistry in Colour

70 Allah's Artistry In Colour

hance the strength of the feathers, store energy coming from the sun and pre-
vent harmful ultraviolet rays from entering the body.
Butterflies
Formation of colour in the wings of butterflies is quite interesting. The
light is reflected through the scales on the wings of a butterfly forming
colours which are "actually non-existent" but which display an extraordinary
symmetry and beauty. We just said that they are "actually non-existent", you
wonder why?
Butterflies are known for the beauty of their wings that have sur-
faces that are relatively much wider than their thorax. How,
then, do these spectacular patterns and colours in the
wings of butterflies come about?
Butterflies have a pair of membranous wings, which
are in fact transparent. Since these are covered with scales of
varying thickness, the transparency of the membranous wings
goes unnoticed. These scales increase the aerodynamic qualities of the but-
terflies' wings, and give them their colour. The scales, which are so delicate
as to fall from their places as soon as they are touched, have
sharply-pointed ends sticking into the wings of the butterfly. In
this way, the scales remain attached without falling off. Each of
these tiny scales, which seem like overlapping shingles on a
roof, take on a colour either by chemical pigments or by its structure
which refracts the light falling onto it into rainbow colours as does a soap
bubble. 41 In addition, laboratory research has shown that
different colours depend on different chemical sub-