Dynamics and energetics of animal swimming and flying: introduction.

This symposium approaches answers to these questions from multiple directions. Four primary sets of technological developments have come together in the past decade to make it possible to revisit each of these questions in innovative, quantitative ways. These developments are: a) highspeed digital video photography; b) algorithms for rapid analysis of digital images; c) laser based quantitative flow visualization techniques (DPIV: digital particle imaging velocimetry); and d) algorithms for computational fluid dynamics (CFD). Interdisciplinary collaborative investigations using these technologies, involving physiologists, functional morphologists, mathematical and physical modelers, and engineers, are producing refined and elegant analyses of the dynamics and energetics of animal movements through both compressible and incompressible fluids. This symposium presents state of the art reports from active participants in this work. In recent years four important research-related trends have converged: a) The technical developments cited have made possible many kinds of measurements that were previously obtainable only with great difficulty, if at all. Many of the papers included here are based upon use of these new techniques. b) The field has been enriched by the recruitment of a substantial number of new, creative, active younger researchers. Many of these people are represented here. c) There has been an increase in the availability of