LMH Fellow reveals secrets of long-haul insect flight

In collaboration with researchers from  the University of New South Wales, Prof Thomas and his colleagues at the Oxford Animal Flight Group used images from multiple high-speed digital video cameras to reconstruct how the 3D shape of a locust's wing changes in flight. They used their 3D models in an engineering computer simulation more commonly used to model aircraft flight to predict the aerodynamics of the flight and showed that the shape and speed of the wings resulted in higher power than a rigid  wing of the same size.

The team  ran their simulation with two simplified wing designs: In the first design they removed the wrinkles and curves but left the twist, while in the second design they replaced the wings with rigid flat plates.

The results were clear: the simplified models produced plenty of lift, but were much less efficient, requiring much more power for flight. The reason was that the complex deforming shape of the real wings allowed the air to flow smoothly over their surface, even as the wing was being flapped about. When the details of the real wings were lost, the flow separated away from the surface, resulting in high but costly lift. The consequences were dramatic: the fully deforming wings generated one and a half times the lift of the flat plate wings for the same amount of power.

In addition to its biological importance, the work has direct implications for the design of small robotic aircraft.

Read more in The New York Times, Channel 4 News , ABCNews, Wired.com, ScienceNOW and The Times of India web pages.

View images and video of the locust flight modelling.