Pranav Khandelwal

Pranav Khandelwal

Apr 07, 2016

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Flying lizards are parachutes?



The lizard curls up its body in the shape of a parachute to increase air resistance in the direction of motion. This helps him to slow down, activate it's landing gear (limbs) and swoop in for a perfect landing! This is just one of many examples of how they can modify their body shape to manipulate air flow around them.

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About This Project

Gliding animals are not paper planes - and yet many studies have modeled them so. Flying lizards are agile gliders with a unique wing design, capable of active control over their glide path. Past research has studied lizard glides in 2D, which cannot capture details like body shape and orientation. I will track body points in 3D during the glide along with morphometric measurements, which will lead to more realistic models and give insights into gliding biomechanics of these animals.

Blast off!

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