The ability of modern airplane surfaces to achieve laminar flow has been well-accepted in recent years. Obtaining the maximum benefit of laminar flow for aircraft drag reduction requires maintaining ...

About 350 million years ago, our planet witnessed the evolution of the first flying creatures. They are still around, and some of them continue to annoy us with their buzzing. While scientists have ...

Not even the best pilot in the world can fly an airplane like the erratic path of an insect, and now scientists know why — bugs are simply exempt from the same laws of aerodynamics that apply to ...

Because insects possess low muscular strength, in some way their corrugated wings must give them aerodynamic advantages. Yet scientists have not fully understood the mechanism at work because of the ...

New research using high-speed digital imaging shows that, at least for some insects, wings that flex and deform, something like what happens to a heavy beach towel when you snap it to get rid of the ...

The secret to the flight of the hummingbird and other tiny birds and insects lies in the looping, swirling flow of air, called a vortex, that their flapping wings create. These aerodynamically ...

It’s not very common that a robot the size of a paper clip is able to do ten flips in eleven seconds and keep on course within five centimeters, says Markus Waibel of Waibel Robotics in Zurich. But ...

Sea butterflies are snails that have inverted themselves. Instead of using their flesh (via a foot) to crawl on the sea floor, they turned upside down and make their protruding bodies into “wings.” ...

Scientists undertook a study of dragonfly wings in order to better understand the relationship between a corrugated wing structure and vortex motions. They discovered that corrugated wings exhibit ...