I’ve sat on this question a while because it’s such an interesting one to me. The biggest issue here is that you’d have to specify which bats you’re making your theoretical ancient ancestor, because there’s such a vast diversity of behavior within the group. A vampire bat would be different from a sac-winged bat would be different from a hoary bat would be different from a flying fox ancestor, is what I’m saying. Any social or behavioral organization paradigm that you can think of, there’s a bat that has it.
So to think about what a sapient bat would look like, we first need to assess the intelligence and behavior of possible ancestral bats. And here I’m gonna stick a readmore, because this gets looooong.
Bat Bot, a lightweight flier with thin silicone wings stretched over a carbon fiber skeleton, can cruise, dive and bank turn just like its namesake, researchers report February 1 in Science Robotics.
Such a maneuverable machine could one day soar up the towering structures of a construction site, flying in and out of steel beams to help keep track of a building’s progress, study coauthor Seth Hutchinson, a roboticist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, said in a news briefing January 31.
Other aerial robots, like some drones, aren’t so agile, relying on four whirling rotor blades to lift off the ground, Hutchinson said. These bots also have trouble flying in the wind, because they can exert force in only one direction, he said. Bat Bot’s flexible wings could make it a more versatile flier.
“Bat flight is the holy grail of aerial robotics,” said study coauthor Soon-Jo Chung, a Caltech aerospace engineer. Bats have more than 40 joints in their wings, which give the animals exquisite control over their flight maneuvers. Chung and colleagues re-created nine of the key joints, so their robot could flap its wings in sync, fold each wing independently and move each of its hind legs up and down. At 93 grams, with a wingspan of 47 centimeters, Bat Bot is roughly the size of an Egyptian fruit bat, Chung said.
#and on a lighter note #bat #the more you know #the power of science #I just saw this on Daily Planet! #like five minutes ago #apparently it can’t fly if it weighs more than about 100g #it was tricky even getting it light enough that it could support its own weight #definitely not a cargo bot #(which doesn’t stop it from being useful in other ways)
Free-tailed bats have now been clocked flying horizontally at over 160 kilometers per hour (that’s nearly 100 mph!), toppling the previous record-holder, the swift. The record for speed of diving is still held by the peregrine falcon but we’re coming for you next, feathers.
Kevin, this is true, except that if I had to save one of you, I’m afraid bats are much more vital to the ecosystem, but I would feel REALLY horrible about it.
…this was not as romantic as I hoped.
Tags:
#anything that makes me laugh this much deserves a reblog
Brinens and Things 