Researchers at the University of Florida have been
studying in minute detail the shape of seagull’s wings. They have been observing the remarkable
aerobatic manoeuvres of seagulls, noting how they flex their wings at the elbow
and the shoulder joints. They have built
a prototype remote-controlled drone with a seagull’s ability to hover, dive and
climb rapidly. These cleverly engineered
wings enable the small aircraft to hover and dive between tall buildings. Some military personnel are keen to develop
such a highly manoeuvrable craft to use in searching for chemical or biological
weapons in big cities. Who really
deserves the credit for designs such as this?
Scientists have also been examining seagulls’
legs. A seagull does not freeze even
while standing on ice. How does it
conserve its body heat? Part of the
secret lies in the fascinating design feature found in a number of animals that
live in cold regions. It is called the
countercurrent heat exchanger. In this
system the heat and the cold flow in opposite directions and nearly all the
heat will transfer
to the cold region.
When a seagull stands on ice the heat exchangers in its legs warms the
blood as it returns to the bird’s cold feet.
They conserve heat in the bird’s body and prevent heat loss from its
feet. This design has been described as
‘one of the world’s most effective regenerative heat exchangers.’ It is so ingenious that human engineers have
copied it.
What can aircraft designers learn from the humpback
whale? A great deal, it seems! An adult humpback whale weighs about thirty
tons and has a relatively stiff body with large flippers. This twelve metre long animal is remarkably
agile under water and can turn in extraordinarily tight circles. Scientists have discovered that the secret
lies in the shape of the whale’s flippers.
The leading edge of its flippers is not smooth like an aircraft wing,
but serrated, with a row of protruding bumps called tubercles As the whale slices through the water, these
tubercles increase lift and reduce drag.
The tubercles make the water accelerate over the flippers in an
organised rotating flow even when the whale is rising at very steep angles. Aircraft wings based on this design would
need fewer wing flaps or other mechanical devices to alter airflow and would be
safer and easier to maintain.
Biomechanics expert John Long believes that soon ‘we may well see every
single jetliner with the bumps of humpback whale flippers.’
Some commercial airliners have computerised
autopilot systems that can not only guide a plane but also land it. Using a brain the size of the tip of a
ballpoint pen, the monarch butterfly migrates up to 3,000 kilometres from
Canada to a small patch of forest in Mexico.
This butterfly relies on the sun to help it navigate and it has the
ability to compensate for the movement of the sun across the sky.
Each eye of a dragonfly is made up of some 30,000
lenses. These lenses produce images that
combine to create a wide mosaic view.
The compound eyes of the dragonfly are superb at detecting
movement. Engineers have succeeded in
developing an artificial compound eye that fits its 8,500 lenses into a space
the size of a pinhead. Such lenses could
be used in high-speed motion detectors and ultra-thin multi-directional
cameras.
The brilliant ranges of nature programmes on
television are full of the wonders of creation.
Did those wonders come into being without a wonder-worker? Can such brilliant designs somehow come about
without a designer? Where did all the
wonderful ideas originate? Yet so many
people – some scientists and naturalists included – believe that this
extraordinary universe has come into existence without the intervention of any
intelligent Being. St Paul was totally
at a loss to explain such blindness: ‘For what can he known about God is plain
to them, because God has shown it to them.
Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine
nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the
many things he has made, so they are without excuse ....claiming to be wise,
they became fools.’ (Romans 1:18-22)
