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The rotation toughening mechanism of barb–barbule joint in the barb delamination of feathers

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Abstract

The barb–barbule structure branching from a feather shaft is a basic unit of a bird feather, and the structure is intricately organized to form the feather vane, which plays an important role in keeping the feather’s integrity during bird flight. In this paper, by coupling nonlinear large deformations of the barb and barbule, an analytical model of delaminating two neighboring barbs on the basis of critical-friction detaching criteria is developed. Considering the rotation and non-rotation of barb–barbule joints in the delamination, a rotatable model (LargeRM) and a non-rotatable model (LargeNRM) are treated to explain the rotation’s contribution to toughening the feather vane. The results show that the predicted interlocking forces of un-detached barbules in the two models were linearly distributed during the delamination. Due to the rotatable barb–barbule joint, the critical detaching force and the elastic strain energy of the two neighboring barbs in the LargeRM are greater than those in the LargeNRM, and this indicates that the rotatable barb–barbule joint could enhance the in-plane delaminating toughness of the feather vane. The present model reveals the nonlinear barb delamination behavior and explains the rotation toughening mechanism of the barb–barbule joint in the barb delamination and further is used to design new bio-inspired interlocking materials, e.g., the feather-inspired Velcro fastener.

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Acknowledgements

This work was partially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) (Nos. 31300780, 11972118, 11772093, 61821002), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (No. 2242016R30014, 2242017K40221), and ARC (FT140101152). NMP is supported by the European Commission with the Graphene Flagship Core 2 n. 785219 (WP14 “Composites”) and FET Proactive “Neurofibres” n. 732344 as well as by the MIUR with the “Departments of Excellence” grant L. 232/2016, ARS01-01384-PROSCAN and PRIN-20177TTP3S.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Biomechanics Laboratory, School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, 210096, P. R. China

    Qiang Chen & Zhiyong Li

  2. Laboratory of Bio-Inspired and Graphene Nanomechanics, Department of Civil, Environmental and Mechanical Engineering, University of Trento, 38123, Trento, Italy

    Nicola M. Pugno

  3. School of Engineering and Materials Science, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, London, E14NS, UK

    Nicola M. Pugno

  4. Ket Lab, Edoardo Amaldi Foundation, Via del Politecnico snc, 00133, Rome, Italy

    Nicola M. Pugno

  5. School of Chemistry, Physics and Mechanical Engineering, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, QLD, 4001, Australia

    Zhiyong Li

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  1. Qiang Chen
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  2. Nicola M. Pugno
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Correspondence to Qiang Chen.

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Chen, Q., Pugno, N.M. & Li, Z. The rotation toughening mechanism of barb–barbule joint in the barb delamination of feathers. Acta Mech 231, 1173–1186 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00707-019-02566-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00707-019-02566-w

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