Speed bursts in sharks linked to spine stiffening

1/25/2017

  Randy EwoldtAn article on Assistant Professor Randy Ewoldt’s research exploring the structural properties and performance of a shark&

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Randy Ewoldt
Randy Ewoldt
Randy Ewoldt
An article on Assistant Professor Randy Ewoldt’s research exploring the structural properties and performance of a shark’s spine as it swims has been published in Nature.
 
“It emerges that a dogfish shark's spine becomes stiffer as the fish swims faster, enabling the animal to swim efficiently at different speeds. The finding could also provide inspiration for the design of robotic biomaterials,” write article coauthors Matthew A. Kolmann and Adam P. Summers. Read the full Nature article, "Biomaterials: Sharks shift their spine into full gear."
 
Ewoldt’s research, on which he collaborated with Professor Marianne Porter (Florida Atlantic University) and Professor John Long (Vassar College), was published and highlighted earlier this year in the Journal of Experimental Biology.
 
Ewoldt conducts fundamental research in fluid mechanics and rheology of complex fluids motivated by both their unavoidable and opportunistic novel functionality. Work often involves interdisciplinary collaborations and is a combination of experiment and theory. Complex fluids are ubiquitous in nature and in man-made applications and therefore research extends from bioengineering to manufacturing and robotics.

 


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This story was published January 25, 2017.