In this German Wikipedia article about optical activity, I found the beautiful picture of starch granules:
Unfortunately, I have no idea what I am looking at. What are these crosses and why are they blue (i.e., same as the background color)?
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Sign up to join this communityIn this German Wikipedia article about optical activity, I found the beautiful picture of starch granules:
Unfortunately, I have no idea what I am looking at. What are these crosses and why are they blue (i.e., same as the background color)?
The figures you see are isogyres and arise in substances that are optically active, which means that polarized light is transmitted through the material in different ways depending on the orientation of the sample. These figures are called interference figures. I highly recommend that you peruse this excellent write-up on the optical properties of minerals, particularly the sections pertaining to uniaxial and biaxial crystals, birefringence, and how a petrographic microscope works.
From the Wikipedia entry on conoscopic interference pattern:
The figures are produced by optical interference when diverging light rays travel through an optically non-isotropic substance - that is, one in which the substance's refractive index varies in different directions within it.
Starch is uniaxial and the figures you see are characteristic of uniaxial materials when viewed using a petrographic microscope. See this reference (The Principles of Pharmacognocy. F. A. Flückiger and A. Tscirch. William Wood & Company, New York, 1887), pages 118-119.
As for the color seen in the image you reference: that arises from using a mica (or tint) plate which in turn indicates whether the substance is uniaxial positive or uniaxial negative, which refer to the propagation of light along differing optical axes. However, in your figure, the color of the isogyres and the background are both blue, which indicates to me that the blue color is simply a result of polarized light passing through the substance.