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Flight of Mammals: From Terrestrial Limbs to Wings pp 227–258Cite as

Functional Analysis of Locomotor Apparatus of Bats

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Abstract

Various aspects of bat locomotion are considered, including terrestrial one. Wingbeat cycle and interaction of the wing with the air are discussed in detail. A new model of the shoulder girdle mobility in flight is established, which differs significantly from the common point of view. Static model of the muscular forces in the forelimb and shoulder girdle is developed for the case of mid-downstroke in forward flight. Specific features of the forelimb musculature in bats are interpreted in functional terms. The chapter includes the following subchapters: Locomotor Features of Chiropterans; Kinematics of Chiropteran Wing; Interaction of Wing with Air; Internal Biomechanics of Wing; Static Analysis of Downstroke. It is supplied with 2 grayscale and 10 colored illustrations, which include the photos of alive bats, original drawings representing kinematic and static models being considered, and additional X-ray frame sequences of the wingbeat cycle of Rousettus aegyptiacus.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In the upstroke of the continuous vortex gait, the downstroke muscles (e.g., the m. pectoralis) should be kept active to withstand the excess air pressure from below which results in aerodynamic lift. However, since the wings are being raised, these muscles are inevitably forcibly stretched. So, they produce negative work reducing the kinetic energy of the body.

  2. 2.

    By that time, based on the same technique, the concept of discrete gaits has been already disproved for birds, and the upstroke wake was found at their slow speeds (Spedding et al. 2003).

  3. 3.

    Such separate vortex rings with reversed rotation shed from the distal part of the wing in the upstroke were not reported in birds (Hedenström et al. 2009).

  4. 4.

    In the static equilibrium, all parts of a body are at rest or in uniform rectilinear motion. In the presence of accelerations of certain parts, D’Alembert’s principle is applicable, which states that a body would be in equilibrium under the action of all the applied forces, together with introduced virtual inertia forces opposite in direction and corresponding in magnitude to these accelerations and inertial torques similarly opposing angular accelerations. Based on this, it is possible to analyze even complex movements, having divided them into successive stages.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Morphological Adaptations of Vertebrates Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia

    Aleksandra A. Panyutina

  2. Department of Vertebrate Zoology Biological Faculty, Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia

    Aleksandra A. Panyutina, Leonid P. Korzun & Alexander N. Kuznetsov

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  1. Aleksandra A. Panyutina
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  2. Leonid P. Korzun
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  3. Alexander N. Kuznetsov
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Correspondence to Aleksandra A. Panyutina .

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Panyutina, A., Korzun, L., Kuznetsov, A. (2015). Functional Analysis of Locomotor Apparatus of Bats. In: Flight of Mammals: From Terrestrial Limbs to Wings. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-08756-6_5

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