From a central feather shaft extends a series of slender barbs, each sprouting smaller barbules, like branches from a bough, lined with tiny hooks. When these grasp on to the hooklets of ...

Previously, co-author Andrea Weidlich of NVIDIA had built a module in a graphics rendering software program to build the feathers, from the shaft to the barbule, and Yu integrated the iridescence ...

Each swan feather has a shaft with closely spaced barbs extending outward, and each barb has even smaller branches, or barbules, that interlock with each other to create a stiff, textured surface.