Whatis

Our everyday sense of color is based on the absorption of light. If our shirt appears red, a dye or pigment is absorbing all of the colors except for red. By contrast, structural color is based on reflection, not absorption. Structural color is an important consequence of the fact that light is a wave. We can define the color either through the wavelength — the physical distance between the repeating crests, or the period — the amount of time for the wave to repeat. »