Journal Article10.1038/384626A0
Leading-edge vortices in insect flight
Charles P. Ellington,Coen van den Berg,Coen van den Berg,Alexander P. Willmott,Adrian L. R. Thomas,Adrian L. R. Thomas +5 more
1.8K
TL;DR: In this article, the authors visualized the airflow around the wings of the hawkmoth Manduca sexta and a 'hovering' large mechanical model, and found an intense leading-edge vortex was found on the downstroke, of sufficient strength to explain the high-lift forces.
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Abstract: INSECTS cannot fly, according to the conventional laws of aerodynamics: during flapping flight, their wings produce more lift than during steady motion at the same velocities and angles of attack1–5. Measured instantaneous lift forces also show qualitative and quantitative disagreement with the forces predicted by conventional aerodynamic theories6–9. The importance of high-life aerodynamic mechanisms is now widely recognized but, except for the specialized fling mechanism used by some insect species1,10–13, the source of extra lift remains unknown. We have now visualized the airflow around the wings of the hawkmoth Manduca sexta and a 'hovering' large mechanical model—the flapper. An intense leading-edge vortex was found on the down-stroke, of sufficient strength to explain the high-lift forces. The vortex is created by dynamic stall, and not by the rotational lift mechanisms that have been postulated for insect flight14–16. The vortex spirals out towards the wingtip with a spanwise velocity comparable to the flapping velocity. The three-dimensional flow is similar to the conical leading-edge vortex found on delta wings, with the spanwise flow stabilizing the vortex.
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Citations
Review of insect-inspired wing micro air vehicle.
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TL;DR: In this article , the authors reviewed the mechanism designs of insect-inspired micro-air vehicles and their aerodynamics, including the wing type effect, vibration characteristics and aerodynamic characteristics of the flapping wing.
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Numerical simulation of flapping‐wing insect hovering flight at unsteady flow
TL;DR: In this article, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis was conducted to study the unsteady aerodynamics of a virtual flying bumblebee during hovering flight, and the integrated geometry of bumblebees was established to define the shape of a 3D virtual bumble bee model with beating its wings, accurately mimicking the three-dimensional movements of wings during hovering.
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Force measurements on a scaled mechanical model of dragonfly in forward flight
W. Lai,J. Yan,M. Motamed,S. Green +3 more
- 18 Jul 2005
TL;DR: In this article, a dynamically scaled flapping-wing model was developed to investigate the aerodynamic phenomena and flight performance of insect-scale flapping wings, which consists of two wings, each having three rotational degrees of freedom, mounted on a linear stage to permit translation in a fluid-filled tank.
13
References
Quick Estimates of Flight Fitness in Hovering Animals, Including Novel Mechanisms for Lift Production
TL;DR: In this article, the average lift coefficient, Reynolds number, the aerodynamic power, the moment of inertia of the wing mass and the dynamic efficiency in animals which perform normal hovering with horizontally beating wings are derived.
1.3K
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Experiments on the Weis-Fogh mechanism of lift generation by insects in hovering flight. Part 1. Dynamics of the ‘fling’
TL;DR: In this paper, a series of experiments using simplified mechanical models were conducted to investigate the mechanism for the generation of large lift coefficients by insects in hovering flight, and some minor modifications to the Weis-Fogh-Lighthill (1973) explanation of the so-called clap and fling mechanism were suggested.
414
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