Flying snakes can undulate their bodies as they glide through the air, and those unique movements allow them to take flight, the scientists discovered.
These snakes, like Chrysopelea paradisi, also known as the paradise tree snake, tend to reside in trees in southern and southeast Asia. While there, they move along the branches of the trees and sometimes, to reach another tree, they jump into the air and glide at an angle.
For their research published in the journal Nature Physics, Virginia Tech scientists placed motion capture tags on seven snakes and filmed them with high-speed cameras as the snakes flew through a four-story theater.
Jack Socha, a professor in Virginia Tech’s biomedical and mechanical engineering department who has studied these snakes for more than 20 years, worked with his colleagues to build a 3D model after measuring more than 100 slides of live snakes.
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The serpent of the tree of paradise mid-glide.
(Photo by Jake Socha)
His model takes into account the frequencies of undulating waves, their direction, the forces acting on the body, and the mass distribution. With it, researchers have conducted virtual experiments to investigate air ripple.
“In all these years, I think I have seen close to a thousand landslides,” Socha said in a statement. “It is still amazing to see her every time. When you see it in person, there is something a little different about it. It is still shocking. What exactly is this animal doing? Being able to answer the questions I’ve had since I was a graduate student, many, many years later, is incredibly satisfying. ”
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In a set of experiments that aimed to discern why ripple was part of every glide, they simulated what would happen if it didn’t. They did it by turning it off. When his virtual snake could not undulate in midair, his body would fall.
That test, combined with simulated glides that kept the movement going, confirmed his hypothesis: that air ripple improves rotational stability in flying snakes.
“This work demonstrates that aerial undulation in snakes performs a different function than the known uses of undulation in other animals, and suggests a new control template for dynamic flying robots,” conclude the scientists in their article summary.
