If sunlight shines straight onto a peacock feather, the feather appears bright b

Question

If sunlight shines straight onto a peacock feather, the feather appears bright blue when viewed from 12? on either side of the incident beam of light. The blue color is due to diffraction from parallel rods of melanin in the feather barbules, as is shown below. Other wavelengths in the incident light are diffracted at different angles, leaving only the blue light to be seen. The average wavelength of blue light is 470 nm.(Figure 1)

Assuming this to be the first-order diffraction, what is the spacing of the melanin rods in the feather?

Explanation / Answer

I just did it in MasteringPhysics. It's because all you had to do was round it. The correct answer is only 0.1 off. It's 2.3 um

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