Sometimes scientific breakthroughs begin in unlikely places. For a team of engineers and entomologists from Princeton University and University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, it started in a hot parking lot, running after grasshoppers.
What they learned from those insects is now shaping a new generation of simple, energy-saving flying robots.
The research focuses on the American grasshopper, Schistocerca americana, a species known for its ability to glide long distances with very little effort.
The scientists’ findings were published in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface.
The project was led by mechanical and aerospace engineer Aimy Wissa from Princeton, working closely with entomologist Marianne Alleyne from the University of Illinois.
Alleyne studies insects not just to understand biology, but also to uncover natural designs that could inspire better engineering.
Grasshoppers, Alleyne explained, have two pairs of wings. The front wings are tough and protective, while the back wings are thin, flexible, and much larger. These hindwings unfold when the insect wants to glide. Instead of flapping constantly, the grasshopper spreads its wings and lets the air do most of the work.
“Gliding is a cheap form of flight,” Wissa said. Flapping takes energy, but gliding allows an animal—or a robot—to travel farther while using much less power.
One feature of the grasshopper’s hindwings immediately caught the researchers’ attention: they are not flat. When fully opened, the wings have ridges and grooves, a structure known as corrugation. Scientists weren’t sure whether this uneven surface helped flight, made it worse, or simply existed to allow the wings to fold neatly when not in use.
To find out, the team scanned real grasshopper wings using CT imaging, which allowed them to capture the wings’ precise 3D shape. Using this data, engineers created and 3D-printed a series of small gliders, each copying different wing features. Some had corrugated surfaces like real wings, while others were smooth. The gliders were then tested in water tanks and launched across a robotics lab to see how well they could glide.
The results were surprising. Corrugation did help produce lift, but the smooth wings actually performed best overall. This suggests that while corrugation may be important for folding and durability, it may slightly reduce gliding efficiency.
The researchers now want to combine the best of both worlds: wings that can fold like a grasshopper’s but glide as smoothly as possible. Beyond robotics, the work is also helping biologists better understand why insect wings evolved the way they did.
As Alleyne noted, this collaboration shows how engineering and biology can inform each other, turning a parking-lot chase into insights that may one day help small robots glide through the air with grasshopper-like efficiency.
Source: KSR.
