Why butterflies?

The amazing colors of butterfly wings have long enchanted our hearts of minds. The colors on their wings are the result of a finely orchestrated arrangement of scales that vary in pigment and structure. During metamorphosis we can watch as the different colors develop across the wing, until the butterfly emerges and displays its pattern in full. The final color pattern can be thought of us a "read out" of the genetic blueprints. Here, we're using trying to better understand how differences in the genetic blueprint actually cause a change in the color of a butterfly's wing.