Dynamics of freely swimming flexible foils

Alben, Silas; Witt, Charles; Baker, T. Vernon; Anderson, Erik J.; Lauder, George V.

doi:10.1063/1.4709477

Cited by 175 publications

(134 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…Indeed, when a dead fish is dragged through water it flutters and moves in a manner reminiscent of a live, swimming fish (23). Similarly, a passive flexible foil whose tip is subject to oscillations can generate thrust (11,22). These observations suggest that the nervous system can work in close conjunction with and profits from elastohydrodynamic effects.…”

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confidence: 92%

“…The hydrodynamics of swimming has been the subject of a variety of studies for more than half a century from experimental (3-6), theoretical (7)(8)(9)(10)(11), and computational (12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19) perspectives. Recently there has been growing interest in integrating these physical approaches with neurobiological models using coupled neuromechanical simulations (20) and biomimetic devices (21,22) to study developmental and evolutionary aspects of the problem.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Gait and speed selection in slender inertial swimmers

Gazzola

Argentina

Mahadevan

2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Inertial swimmers use flexural movements to push water and generate thrust. We quantify this dynamical process for a slender body in a fluid by accounting for passive elasticity and hydrodynamics and active muscular force generation and proprioception. Our coupled elastohydrodynamic model takes the form of a nonlinear eigenvalue problem for the swimming speed and locomotion gait. The solution of this problem shows that swimmers use quantized resonant interactions with the fluid environment to enhance speed and efficiency. Thus, a fish is like an optimized diode that converts a prescribed alternating transverse motion to forward motion. Our results also allow for a broad comparative view of swimming locomotion and provide a mechanistic basis for the empirical relation linking the swimmer's speed U, length L, and tail beat frequency f, given by U=L ∼ f [Bainbridge R (1958) J Exp Biol 35:109-133]. Furthermore, we show that a simple form of proprioceptive sensory feedback, wherein local muscle activation is function of body curvature, suffices to drive elastic instabilities associated with thrust production and leads to a spontaneous swimming gait without the need for a central pattern generator. Taken together, our results provide a simple mechanistic view of swimming consistent with natural observations and suggest ways to engineer artificial swimmers for optimal performance.inertial swimming | gait selection | proprioception U nderstanding locomotory behavior requires that we integrate the neural control of muscular dynamics with the body mechanics of the organism as it interacts with the environment. Simultaneously, we must also account for sensory feedback from the environment and from the organism's sense of its own shape. However, translating these concepts to quantitative theories is challenging because of the variety of organism sizes and shapes and the complexity of their physical and biological environment. Therefore, investigations typically focus on specific organisms and try to glean principles that might be of broader relevance. In the context of terrestrial locomotion, recent experimental and theoretical work on the undulating worm Caenorhabditis elegans (1) shows that proprioceptive feedback suffices to coordinate undulatory motions. Complementing these studies, general theoretical models have explored the conditions under which coordinated crawling occurs in a coupled brain-body-environment system (2). These models explain observations in larvae of Drosophila melanogaster, showing how a sensorimotor coupling that links brain, body, and environment can robustly lead to crawling in a range of conditions.Translating these ideas to macroscopic aquatic locomotion, when inertia dominates viscous forces, is a formidable challenge owing to the presence of complex hydrodynamic nonlinearities, which must be coupled to body mechanics and neural dynamics of proprioceptive and sensory feedback. The hydrodynamics of swimming has been the subject of a variety of studies for more than half a century from experimen...

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confidence: 92%

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confidence: 99%

Gait and speed selection in slender inertial swimmers

Gazzola

Argentina

Mahadevan

2015

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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“…The non-linear effects are addressed by Castro et al 15 experimentally and theoretically for a periodically forced cantilevered plate immersed in a still fluid. Alben et al 16 and Ramananarivo, Godoy-Diana, and Thiria 17 investigated the propulsion performance of a self-propelled flag with a local actuator at its leading edge. The propulsive efficiency is found to be influenced by the flag's length, rigidity, and the dissipation of energy along the flag's body.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Response of a flexible filament in a flowing soap film subject to a forced vibration

Jia

Xiao

et al. 2015

Physics of Fluids

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This version is available at https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/54811/ Strathprints is designed to allow users to access the research output of the University of Strathclyde. Unless otherwise explicitly stated on the manuscript, Copyright © and Moral Rights for the papers on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. Please check the manuscript for details of any other licences that may have been applied. You may not engage in further distribution of the material for any profitmaking activities or any commercial gain. You may freely distribute both the url (https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/) and the content of this paper for research or private study, educational, or not-for-profit purposes without prior permission or charge.Any correspondence concerning this service should be sent to the Response of a flexible filament in a flowing soap film subject to a forced vibration The interactions between flexible plates and fluids are important physical phenomena. A flag in wind is one of the most simplified and classical models for studying the problem. In this paper, we investigated the response of a flag in flow with an externally forced vibration by using flexible filaments and soap film. Experiments show that for a filament that is either in oscillation or stationary, the external forced vibration leads to its oscillation. A synchronization phenomenon occurs in the experiments. A small perturbation leads to a large response of flapping amplitude in response. The insight provided here is helpful to the applications in the flow control, energy harvesting, and bionic propulsion areas. C 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.

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“…Eldredge and Pisani [31] and Wilson and Eldredge [32] have also performed simulations of a self-propelled flexible swimmers represented by an articulated system of linked rigid bodies. Recently, self-propelled flapping devices with realistic flexible wings were built to investigate the role of resonance in optimizing the performance [33,34] and the scaling of cruising speed with foil length and bending rigidity [35]. A numerical study of such system was also performed in [35], where the foil is treated as an elastica and a 'body-vortexsheet' model is used for the fluid.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recently, self-propelled flapping devices with realistic flexible wings were built to investigate the role of resonance in optimizing the performance [33,34] and the scaling of cruising speed with foil length and bending rigidity [35]. A numerical study of such system was also performed in [35], where the foil is treated as an elastica and a 'body-vortexsheet' model is used for the fluid. This fluid model is still based on the potential (inviscid) flow theory, although some empirical models were used to include the effect of viscous drag.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%