Optical mechanism of flower color diversity and the modification by gene transfer

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The textures of flowers are of important ornamental characteristics. Reflected light from surfaces of petals including colorful bracts and leaves is a key factor for the textures of flowers. Through observing various petals of flowers, results indicate that the reflected light includes two types; one is the superficial reflected light which is determined by the shape of the epidermis cells. More light is reflected by the flat epidermis cells than that by the papillate epidermis cells. Especially, when the angle of incident light was changed, the belt-shaped reflected light was only observed by the microscope in the side of the papillate epidermis cells. The other type of the reflected light is scattering reflected light which is determined by the structure of the petals. The higher pigments content, the more light are absorbed. The intensity and place of the scattering reflected light was determined by the volume and the place of air-space which distribute among of the epidermal cells, palisade cells and spongy cells. The three typical textures of flowers: velvet luster (e.g. Viola tricolor) is determined by the superficial reflected light, metallic luster (e.g. Begonia rex) and diamond dust (e.g. Impatiens sultani) are determined by the scattering reflected light.