Mosquito wing II epi, iridescence

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Tue May 24, 2011 3:53 pm

My other recent wing post a couple of days ago were made with transmitted light with the wings "mounted" in water.

For these I put them "dry" under the BH2-UMA vertical illuminator, and used the darkfield cube. The direct light (either darkfield or brightfield) coming through the objective produces extremely intense iridescence with these wings. No compensators or polarization was used.

Eric F · Post by **Eric F** » Tue May 24, 2011 5:18 pm

Fabulous Charles! I believe you have just independently discovered a new and exciting method, called the "Wing Interference Pattern" (WIP), that helps discriminate between species of flies (and other insects) -- which was announced in 2010 (see HERE ). And -- not surprising to us -- you have improved on the existing methods with your great photographic skill!

It seems these iridescent wing patterns may allow the insects that have them signal to one another; and photographing the patterns provides another means for entomologists to tell the insects apart. So far, this WIP pattern has been found in many families of flies (it is particularly well developed in mosquitoes) and chalcidoid hymenoptera (zt02873p026.pdf, an adobe reader file, shows WIP being used in a revision of a wasp genus).

Beautiful work,

Eric

discomorphella · Post by **discomorphella** » Tue May 24, 2011 7:27 pm

Hi Charlie--

Stunning. And to think I was going to try mounting some mosquito wings for transmitted DIC. Looks like that would wreck them as specimens compared to this...Absolutely gorgeous.

David

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Tue May 24, 2011 7:56 pm

Thanks.

Eric,
As I was reading your reply...
"a new and exciting method, called the "Wing Interference Pattern" (WIP), that helps discriminate between species of flies (and other insects)"
... I actually smiled, and for a fraction of a second thought you were "pulling my leg" a bit

But then I saw you were serious!

. Thanks for the link. Fascinating. Curiously, when I observed how intense it was, I did wonder if it served any "purpose". I have seen it on flies, but not this extreme (although I never observed those wings when illuminated with a microscope vertical illuminator in this way).

Linden.g · Post by **Linden.g** » Tue May 24, 2011 8:10 pm

These are spectacular Charles, I wish I could achieve this intensity for my in flight images. Here is one of the best examples I obtained for fruit flies. http://www.flickr.com/photos/13084997@N ... 0450102014. Do the wings need to be at 90 degrees to the light source to obtain the intensity you are seeing

Linden

RogelioMoreno · Post by **RogelioMoreno** » Tue May 24, 2011 8:47 pm

Charles,

Beautiful colors.

Rogelio

Ernst Hippe · Post by **Ernst Hippe** » Wed May 25, 2011 1:28 am

Charles,
PHANTASTIC !!!
I included it into my Hall Of Fame.
Ernst

Marek Mis · Post by **Marek Mis** » Wed May 25, 2011 11:52 pm

Charlie,

Beautiful ! The colours are amazing !

Marek