SUMMARY Turning behaviour in the fruit fly Drosophila depends on several factors including not only feedback from sensory organs and muscular control of wing motion, but also the mass moments of inertia and the frictional damping coefficient of the rotating body. In the present study we evaluate the significance of body friction for yaw turning and thus the limits of visually mediated flight control in Drosophila, by scoring tethered flies flying in a flight simulator on their ability to visually compensate a bias on a moving object and a visual background panorama at different simulated frictional dampings. We estimated the fly's natural damping coefficient from a numerical aerodynamic model based on both friction on the body and the flapping wings during saccadic turning. The model predicts a coefficient of 54×10–12 Nm s, which is more than 100-times larger than the value estimated from a previous study on the body alone. Our estimate suggests that friction plays a larger role for yaw turning in Drosophila than moments of inertia. The simulator experiments showed that visual performance of the fruit fly collapses near the physical conditions estimated for freely flying animals, which is consistent with the suggested role of the halteres for flight stabilization. However, kinematic analyses indicate that the measured loss of flight control might be due predominantly to the limited fine control in the fly's steering muscles below a threshold of 1–2° stroke amplitude, rather than resulting from the limits of visual motion detection by the fly's compound eyes. We discuss the impact of these results and suggest that the elevated frictional coefficient permits freely flying fruit flies to passively terminate rotational body movements without producing counter-torque during the second half of the saccadic turning manoeuvre.

Species traits are an essential currency in ecology, evolution, biogeography, and conservation biology. However, trait databases are unavailable for most organisms, especially those living in difficult-to-access habitats such as caves and other subterranean ecosystems. We compiled an expert-curated trait database for subterranean spiders in Europe using both literature data (including grey literature published in many different languages) and direct morphological measurements whenever specimens were available to us. We started by updating the checklist of European subterranean spiders, now including 512 species across 20 families, of which at least 192 have been found uniquely in subterranean habitats. For each of these species, we compiled 64 traits. The trait database encompasses morphological measures, including several traits related to subterranean adaptation, and ecological traits referring to habitat preference, dispersal, and feeding strategies. By making these data freely available, we open up opportunities for exploring different research questions, from the quantification of functional dimensions of subterranean adaptation to the study of spatial patterns in functional diversity across European caves.

Biologically inspired design is attracting increasing interest since it offers access to a huge biological repository of well proven design principles that can be used for developing new and innovative products. Biological phenomena can inspire product innovation in as diverse areas as mechanical engineering, medical engineering, nanotechnology, photonics, environmental protection and agriculture. However, a major obstacle for the wider use of biologically inspired design is the knowledge barrier that exist between the application engineers that have insight into how to design suitable products and the biologists with detailed knowledge and experience in understanding how biological organisms function in their environment. The biologically inspired design process can therefore be approached using different design paradigms depending on the dominant opportunities, challenges and knowledge characteristics. Design paradigms are typically characterized as either problem-driven, solution-driven, sustainability driven, bioreplication or a combination of two or more of them. The design paradigms represent different ways of overcoming the knowledge barrier and the present paper presents a review of their characterization and application.

The first orb web built by newly hatched spiders resembles the adult web in its overall form and structure. However, many details show ontogenetic changes. One possible explanation for these changes is that the tiny early‐instar spiders with their minute brains will make more mistakes and build less ‘perfect’ orb webs than older and larger juveniles and adults. To test this hypothesis, known as the size limitation hypothesis, I analysed orb webs from three developmental stages, spiderlings, juveniles and adult females, in two neotropical orb‐web spiders, the araneid Eustala illicita and the nephilid Nephila clavipes. Neither species showed clear signs of being behaviourally limited or more prone to committing errors as spiderlings than were older juveniles or adults. These findings therefore do not support the size limitation hypothesis in either species. Finally, I looked for evidence of the ‘biogenetic law’, which predicts that juveniles should build less derived orb webs than the adults. Evidence for this was found in E. illicita, but not in N. clavipes.

Many ant species produce winged reproductive males and females that embark on mating flights. Previous research has shown substantial synchrony in flights between colonies and that weather influences phenology but these studies have been limited by sample size and spatiotemporal scale. Using citizen science, we gathered the largest ever dataset (> 13 000 observations) on the location and timing of winged ant sightings over a three‐year period across a broad spatial scale (the United Kingdom). In total, 88.5% of winged ants sampled were Lasius niger. Observations occurred from June to September with 97% occurring in July/August but exact temporal patterns differed substantially between years. As expected, observations within each year showed a small but significant northward/westward trend as summer progressed. However, the predicted spatiotemporal synchrony was far less apparent; observations were not significantly spatially clustered at national, regional or local scales. Nests in urban (vs rural) areas and those associated with heat‐retaining structures produced winged ants earlier. Local weather conditions rather than broad geographical or seasonal factors were shown to be critical in the timing of winged ant activity, presumably to optimize mate finding and to minimize energy consumption and predation. Temperature and wind speed, but not barometric pressure, were significant predictors of observations (positively and negatively, respectively); winged ants were only observed at temperatures > 13°C and wind‐speeds < 6.3 m–1. All days with a mean daily temperature > 25°C had observations. Intriguingly, changes in temperature and wind speed from the day before flight peaks were also significant. We conclude that: 1) spatiotemporal synchrony in flights is lower than previously thought for L. niger, 2) local temperature and wind are key predictors of flight phenology; and 3) ants appear able to determine, at least in a limited way, if weather is improving or deteriorating and adjust their behaviour accordingly.

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Biomimetics is a rapidly growing field both as an academic and as an applied discipline. This paper gives a short introduction to the current status of the discipline before it describes three approaches to biomimetics: the mechanism-driven, which is based on the study of a specific mechanism; the focused organism-driven, which is based on the study of one function in a model organism; and the integrative organism-driven approach, where multiple functions of a model organism provide inspiration. The first two are established approaches and include many modern studies and the famous biomimetic discoveries of Velcro and the Lotus-Effect, whereas the last approach is not yet well recognized. The advantages of the integrative organism-driven approach are discussed using the ragworms as a case study. A morphological and locomotory study of these marine polychaetes reveals their biomimetic potential, which includes using their ability to move in slippery substrates as inspiration for novel endoscopes, using their compound setae as models for passive friction structures and using their three gaits, slow crawling, fast crawling, and swimming as well as their rapid burrowing technique to provide inspiration for the design of displacement pumps and multifunctional robots.