Bit Spreading Interleave Bits with Zeros

Code

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdint.h>

uint16_t spread_bits(uint8_t val) {
    // x x x x x x x x
    // 0 x 0 x 0 x 0 x 0 x 0 x 0 x 0 x
    uint16_t answer=0;
    //0 -> first bit
    //1 -> 0
    // 0,2,4,6... -> or (i/2)th bit of val
    // 1,3,5,7,9.. -> put 0
    for(int i=0;i<16;i++) {
        if(!(i%2)) {
            answer|=((val>>(i/2)&1)<<i);
        }
        else {
            answer|=(0<<i);
        }
    }
    return answer;
}

int main() {
    uint8_t val;
    scanf("%hhu", &val);

    uint16_t result = spread_bits(val);
    printf("%u", result);
    return 0;
}

Solving Approach