Dylan T.

Williamson
Title: Honey bee flight research
Svitil, Kathy. "Deciphering the Mystery of Bee Flight | Caltech." The California Institute
of Technology.
Michael Dickinson, n.d. Web. 21 Apr. 2015.
http://www.caltech.edu/news/deciphering-mystery-bee-flight-1075
Summary: Honey bee flight has been in question for nearly 70 years, in 1934 it was
stated by August
- Magnan that honey bees shouldnt be able to fly
- Bee flight has been recently explained, because of the stroke, rotation,
and speed of the beat
- bees can stay airborne but its almost impossible
- Typically the smaller the animal the faster they have to beat their wings
and larger animals arch their wings back and forth with a wider arch.
- Honey bees wings have a small arch of about 90 degrees and beat their
wings at 230 BPS (beats per second)
- Fruit flies wings beat at 200 BPS
- When they are carrying pollen of nectar they generate more power by
increasing the arch of their wings
Astronomically it would be more efficient to increase speed instead of arch
evaluation. This source helps by giving a brief history about honey bee flight and
explaining how honey bees fly and how honey bee flight is unique compared to other
insect flight.
Evidence:
The secret of honeybee flight, the researchers say, is the unconventional combination of
short, choppy wing strokes, a rapid rotation of the wing as it flops over and reverses
direction, and a very fast wing-beat frequency.
Being relatively large insects, bees would be expected to beat their wings rather slowly,
and to sweep them across the same wide arc as other flying bugs (whose wings cover
nearly half a circle). They do neither.
When bees want to generate more power-for example, when they are carting around a
load of nectar or pollen- they increase the arc of their wing strokes, but keep flapping at
the same rate.

Douglas L. Altshuler, William B. Dickson, Jason T. Vance, Stephen P. Roberts , Michael

H. Dickinson.

"Short-amplitude High-frequency Wing Strokes Determine the Aerodynamics of

Honeybee Flight."
Short-amplitude High-frequency Wing Strokes Determine the Aerodynamics of
Honeybee Flight. George
N. Somero, 01 Aug. 2015. Web. 20 Apr. 2015.
http://www.pnas.org/content/102/50/18213.full
This was the report of the experiment which used cameras to explain honey bee flight
Bees were placed in a glass container with a stand in the center and recorded while they
flew
A second set of bees was put in a glass container filled with helium because lower air
density
means more power is needed for the bees to hover
Lower air density required the bees to increase the angle of their amplitude from 91
degrees to
132 degrees
Honey Bees beet their wings within a relatively short span but they do so extremely fast.
Although the flight of honey bees has been deciphered it is not yet fully understood.
Evaluation:
I have heard how the flight of honey bees was deciphered using cameras but I learned
specifically the
steps that were taken in this experiment and how this conclusion was determined using
graphs, charts,
equations, and even a robot. My previous research quoted this exact experiment and
used it to
reference the majority of their article on the flight of honey bees.
Quotes:
Aerodynamic forces are proportional to the square of wing tip velocity, itself a product
of stroke

amplitude, wingbeat frequency, and wing length. Thus, a bee hovering with reduced
stroke amplitude
could compensate by increasing its stroke frequency to achieve roughly equivalent
average forces to an
animal flapping with a higher stroke amplitude and lower stroke frequency.
In normal air, the bees hovered with an average wingbeat frequency of 230 Hz and
shallow stroke
amplitude of only 91 (Table 1). In heliox, bees maintained wingbeat frequency but
increased stroke
amplitude to an average value of 132.
Honeybees hover using a shallow stroke amplitude and high wingbeat frequency that
produces multiple
force peaks during each wingbeat (Fig. 1).
Given this result, it is quite curious why honeybees, which, given their foraging habits,
should be under
severe selection for transport efficiency, should hover using an intrinsically inefficient
stroke. Possible
explanations for this paradox emerge by considering the physiological constraints
(proximate
mechanisms) as well as behavioral ecology (ultimate causes) of these central-place
foragers.
Strength: Reliable and factual
understand

Weakness: Hard to

Bumblebee Wings. Bumblebee Wings. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Apr. 2015

http://www.bumblebee.org/bodyWing.htm
Summary:
Bumble Bees have 4 wings, a larger and a smaller one attached to the larger on by
hammulae on
each side
The wings and exoskeleton are made of the same material

Condition of a bees wings can sometimes be used to help determine the age of a bee
A bumble bee queen can fly a distance of 80 Km
Bumble bees will shiver when cold
Evaluation:
This source gives some facts about bee flight and other general information about bees;
it also provides
pictures and an explanation of the structure of a bees wing. Im going to use this
information about the
structure of a bees wing to help guide how I design my artificially made bee wings.
Quotes
The condition of the wings can be used to age a bumblebee to some extent.
In spring masses of bumblebee queens have been seen flying the 80 km over the Gulf of
Finland
between Finland and Estonia. Reasons for the exodus are not yet known, but could be
due to
competition for nest sites, or fleeing from one of their major predators in the area - the
vole - whose
population cycles build to huge numbers in some years, then crash before building
again.
At rest a bumblebee's body temperature will fall to that of its surroundings. To raise the
temperature
of the flight muscles high enough to enable flight the bumblebee shivers, rather the
same a we do when
we are cold.
Strength: Summarized and has good facts

Weaknesses: Not Professional