With final papers submitted and exams finished, life gets so much sweeter. I can go back to enjoying the spring weather, going to friends’ cookouts, and actually working on my research. It’s actually a relief to have enough time to read papers, analyze data–and keep up a blog, perhaps.
In honor of my new-found free time, (and in memory of the many hours spent last week on flight biomechanics) I offer you:
The Leading Edge Vortex Sonnet
Though once they said that bees could never fly
When limited by quasi-steady flow,
The underlying theory was a lie.
Non-steady conditions cause lift to grow.
As vortex sheets roll up above the wing,
Creating a negative pressure core,
Higher lift coefficients they do bring
So that even a bumblebee can soar
And just thirty years later we have found,
Among the flying animals and plants,
Leading-edge vortices on wings abound,
And through the fluids organisms dance.
So when they say you can’t make enough lift
An attached LEV may help you drift.
A leading edge vortex on a moth’s wings. (Picture from Charlie Ellington’s animal flight group at the University of Cambridge.)
** Don’t worry, I’m keeping my day job.
