The transparent wings of some cicada species present ordered arrays of papillary structures
with a spacing of approximately 200 nm. These structures serve an antireflection function, with
optical transmission peaking at a value of approximately 98% and rising above 90% over a
broad band from 450 to 2500 nm. The dimensions of the papillae are comparable to the
roughness scale of surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates. SERS measurements
performed on silver- and gold-coated wings display enhancement factors of approximately
106
with no apparent background contribution from the wing.
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