Kinematic flexibility allows bumblebees to increase energetic efficiency when carrying heavy loads

Kinematic analysis of males with transtibial amputation carrying military loads.

The biomechanical responses to load carriage, a common task for dismounted troops, have been well studied in nondisabled individuals. However, with recent shifts in the rehabilitation and retention process of injured servicemembers, there remains a substantial need for understanding these responses in persons with lower-limb amputations. Temporal-spatial and kinematic gait parameters were analy...

Membrane reactors: A way to increase efficiency

Influence of carrying heavy loads on soldiers' posture, movements and gait.

Military personnel are required to carry heavy loads whilst marching; this load carriage represents a substantial component of training and combat. Studies in the literature mainly concentrate on physiological effects, with few biomechanical studies of military load carriage systems (LCS). This study examines changes in gait and posture caused by increasing load carriage in military LCS. The fo...

Wing flexibility enhances load-lifting capacity in bumblebees.

The effect of wing flexibility on aerodynamic force production has emerged as a central question in insect flight research. However, physical and computational models have yielded conflicting results regarding whether wing deformations enhance or diminish flight forces. By experimentally stiffening the wings of live bumblebees, we demonstrate that wing flexibility affects aerodynamic force prod...

Topological design considering flexibility under periodic loads

Topology optimization has been extensively considered to design the structural configuration for the stiffness maximization and the eigenfrequency maximization. In this paper, we construct a topology optimization method implementing flexibility with the time-periodic loading condition. First, the flexibility in the dynamic periodic loading is formulated using the mutual energy concept. Second, ...