Pausing after clap reduces power required to fling wings apart at low Reynolds number

Abstract

The smallest flying insects, such as thrips (body length < 2 mm), are challenged with needing to move in air at a chord-based Reynolds number (Rec) of the order of 10. Pronounced viscous dissipation at such a low Rec requires considerable energetic expenditure for tiny insects to stay aloft. Thrips flap their densely bristled wings at large stroke amplitudes, bringing both wings in close proximity to each other at the end of upstroke (‘clap’) and moving their wings apart at the start of downstroke (‘fling’). From high-speed videos of free take-off flights of thrips, we observed that their forewings remain clapped for approximately 10% of the wingbeat cycle before the start of downstroke (fling stroke). We sought to examine if there are aerodynamic advantages associated with pausing wing motion after upstroke (clap stroke) and before downstroke (fling stroke) at Rec = 10. A dynamically scaled robotic clap and fling platform was used to measure lift and drag forces generated by physical models of solid (non-bristled) and bristled wings in single wing and wing pair configurations, for pause times ranging between 0% to 41% of the cycle. For solid and bristled wing pairs, pausing before the start of downstroke (fling stroke) dissipated vorticity generated at the end of upstroke (clap stroke). This resulted in a decrease in the drag coefficient averaged across downstroke (fling stroke) and in turn reduced power requirements. Also, increasing the pause time resulted in a larger decrease in the dimensionless power coefficient for the wing-pair configurations compared to the single-wing configurations. Our findings show that wing–wing interaction observed in the clap and fling motion of tiny insect wings is necessary to realize the aerodynamic benefits of pausing before fling, by reducing the power required to clap and fling for a small compromise in lift.