Scales of the scarabaeid beetle Hoplia coerulea (Coleoptera) contain fluorescent molecules embedded in a multilayer structure. The consequence of this source confinement is a modification of the fluorescence properties, i.e., an enhancement or inhibition of the emission of certain wavelengths. In this work, we propose a bio-inspired approach to this problem. In other words, we use numerical simulations based on the one-dimensional transfer-matrix formalism to investigate the influence of a Hoplia-like system on emission characteristics and, from the results, we deduce potential technical applications. We reveal that depending on the choice of some parameters (layer thickness, dielectric constant, and position of the emitting source in the structure), it is possible to enhance or inhibit the fluorescence emission for certain wavelengths. This observation could be of great interest to design new optical devices in the field of optoelectronic, solar cells, biosensors, etc. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4768896]