Bumblebee Wings, ‘Biomechanical Strategies,’ and Insect-Inspired Microbots
Who knew, but apparently bees – while they appear steady in flight to your and my eyes – are actually bumping into things and each other all the time. That’s what researchers at UC Davis discovered when capturing bees with high-speed video to examine their flight patterns and behaviors. Further research details the existence of the protein Reslin located at the joints of wing segments, which allow bee wings to bend during collisions, which, ultimately, researchers want to apply to winged microbots (of course!).
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Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell with Google Hangouts On-Air is every Wednesday at 7:30pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
