Related papers: Fruit flies modulate passive wing pitching to gene…

Ratcheting surfaces are a common motif in nature and appear in plant awns and grasses. They are known to profer selective advantages for seed dispersion and burial. In two simple model experiments we show that these anisotropically toothed…

Like a rocket being propelled into space, evolution has engineered flies to launch into adulthood via multiple stages. Flies develop and deploy two distinct bodies, linked by the transformative process of metamorphosis. The fly larva is a…

Most biological flyers undergo orderly deformation in flight, and the deformations of wings lead to complex fluid-structure interactions. In this paper, an aerodynamic-structural coupling method of flapping wing is developed based on ANSYS…

Avian-informed drones feature morphing wing and tail surfaces, enhancing agility and adaptability in flight. Despite their large potential, realising their full capabilities remains challenging due to the lack of generalized control…

Termites which are able to forage in the open can be often seen, in the field or in the lab: (i) wandering around, forming no observable pattern, or (ii) clustering themselves in a dense and almost immobile pack, or (iii) milling about in a…

Fluidic locomotion of flapping Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs) can be very complex, particularly when the rules from insect flight dynamics (fast flapping dynamics and light wings) are not applicable. In these situations, widely used averaging…

Aerial robotic arms aim to enable inspection and environment interaction in otherwise hard-to-reach areas from the air. However, many aerial manipulators feature bulky or heavy robot manipulators mounted to large, high-payload aerial…

An approach to control tethered wings for airborne wind energy is proposed. A fixed length of the lines is considered, and the aim of the control system is to obtain figure-eight crosswind trajectories. The proposed technique is based on…

We report an unexpected reverse spiral turn in the final stage of the motion of rolling rings. It is well known that spinning disks rotate in the same direction of their initial spin until they stop. While a spinning ring starts its motion…

We have used numerical simulations to investigate how the properties of motor proteins control the dynamical behavior of a driven flexible filament. The filament is pinned at one end and positioned on top of a patch of anchored motor…

Bristled and membranous insect wings have co-evolved despite apparently serving the same functionality. We emulate flight physics using an automated free-fall experiment to better understand how and why several distinct wing forms may have…

In this paper, we take an initial and novel step toward characterizing the physics of the hovering phenomenon in flapping insects and hummingbirds as a new class of extremum seeking (ES) feedback systems. By characterizing hovering flight…

Many small animals, particularly insects, use power-amplification to generate rapid motions, such as jumping, that would otherwise be impossible given the standard power density of muscle. A common framework for understanding this power…

We study a simple two-dimensional model for motion of an elastic filament subject to internally generated stresses and show that wave-like propagating shapes which can propel the filament can be induced by a self-organized mechanism via a…

This study presents a methodology to safely manipulate branches to aid various agricultural tasks. Humans in a real agricultural environment often manipulate branches to perform agricultural tasks effectively, but current agricultural…

Filamentous viruses like influenza and torovirus often display systematic bends and arcs of mysterious physical origin. We propose that such viruses undergo an instability from a cylindrically symmetric to a toroidally curved state. This…

Aeronautics research has continually sought to achieve the adaptability and morphing performance of avian wings, but in practice, wings of all scales continue to use the same hinged control-surface embodiment. Recent research into compliant…

Collective patterns of motion emerge across biological taxa: insects swarm, fish school, and birds flock. In particular, large migratory birds form strikingly ordered V-shaped formations, which experiments and direct numerical simulations…

Oblique collision of solid particles with surfaces has been a topic of extensive study in Newtonian mechanics, which also explains the motion of bubbles and droplets to some extent. Here, we observe that air bubbles exhibit a backflipping…

We experimentally studied the effect of flexibility on the flow produced by sinusoidally pitching foil in quiescent fluid. The rigid foil produces a weak, divergent and meandering jet. On the contrary, the foil with a flexible flap produces…