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Proponents of intelligent design, which holds that a supreme being rather than evolution is responsible for life's complexities, have long criticized science for not being able to explain some natural phenomena, such as now scientists have put this perplexing mystery to rest.
Using a combination of high-speed digital photography and a robotic model of a bee wing, the researchers figured out the flight mechanisms of honeybees.
"For many years, people tried to understand animal flight using the aerodynamics of airplanes and helicopters," said Douglas Altshuler, a researcher at California Institute of Technology. "In the last 10 years, flight biologists have gained a remarkable amount of understanding of dog racing and harness betting online of understanding by shifting to experiments with robots that are capable of flapping wings with the same freedom as the animals."
Exotic flight
The scientists analyzed pictures from hours of filming bees and mimicked the movements using robots with sensors for measuring forces.
Turns out bee flight mechanisms are more exotic than thought.
"The honeybees have a rapid wing beat," Altshuler told LiveScience. "In contrast to the fruit fly that has one eightieth the body size and flaps its wings 200 times each second, the much larger honeybee flaps its wings 230 times every second."
This was a surprise because as insects get smaller, their aerodynamic performance decreases and to compensate, they tend to flap their wings faster.
"And this was just for hovering," Altshuler said of the bees. "They also have to transfer pollen and nectar and carry large loads, sometimes as much as their body mass, for the rest of the colony."
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