Mechanical Butterflies?

Posted by CowboyNeal on Thursday December 12, 2002 @11:23PM from the travelin-arrakis-style dept.

MImeKillEr writes "According to an article on BBC News, two researchers from Oxford took highspeed photographs of an Admiral butterfly in a specially-designed windtunnel to study how butterflies fly. The resulting research brings insight into small-scale flight dynamics. Although the article doesn't give an ETA on this, they expect to be able to build an aircraft with a 10cm wingspan that will be either autonomous or radio controlled. This will allow them to be used in rescue missions, cave exploration and possibly even on Mars."

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Re:mechanical birds = ornithopters by Richard+Kirk · 2002-12-13 00:37 · Score: 5, Interesting

Scale is important. Turbulence happens more readily at large scales. Viscous drag is more significant at smaller scales. Gravity is more significant at larger scales. A very small insect is effectively rowing through the air, using most if its effort to propel itself along. An aircraft spends most of its effort creating lift - and drag, because the two always go together - to keep itself up. So, we're not going to have 747's with butterfly-shaped wings flitting from building to building. Which is a shame....