I’m a little late on this, but an article on bird flight in Nature magazine arrived a couple of weeks ago in step with the change in season. The focus of the article was a study of how swifts adjust their wing configuration depending on the particular task facing them. (See some free coverage, including the spectacular cover image, at ScienceDaily) “Wing morphing” optimizes swifts to be able to make the sharp turns needed to chase insects or to glide while sleeping in the air. Engineering has always looked to birds for inspiration for flight, and projects are already underway to use this understanding of avian design for next-generation aircraft. The U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory has apparently already been working on morphing wing designs for fighter planes.
More birds: Herzog and DeMeuron’s bird’s nest brutalism in renderings for their 2008 Beijing Olympics stadium | Santiago Calatrava’s World Trade Center PATH station | birdsong as a model for human language acquisition | vintage automata that replicate the sound of singing birds | Wikipedia’s list of fictional birds | turning bird song into musical notation and modern composition.
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