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Scientists Glue Wii Remote Parts to Flying Lemurs
Written by Chris 
A backpack using technology borrowed from the iPod and Nintendo Wii has helped scientists learn how an exotic animal flies.
Image by Nina Holopainen
The colugo, or flying lemur, is an animal found in the rainforests of Southeast Asia. It’s not technically a lemur, and in fact is a cousin of the primates that resembles a large flying squirrel.
The animals have large pieces of skin between their hands and their feet. The skin flaps, which can stretch out to the size of a doormat, allow the colugo to glide through the air.
Andrew Spence of the Royal Veterinary College has been studying the aeronautics of he colugo’s flight. He created a backpack to attach to the animals that could help record the specifics about their flight. The backpack used an accelerometer much like the one used in a Nintendo Wii controller and coupled it with a memory chip similar to an iPod. The backpack then could feel and record all the movements of the colugo wearing it.
The scientists installed the backpacks onto several adult colugos. Colugos are nocturnal animals, and so the team caught several of them while they rested during the day. They then shaved a patch off the animals’ back and glued the sensors on with surgical adhesive. It sounds a bit to me like a frathouse prank, but I've been assured this is legitimate scientific procedure.
The backpacks revealed that the animals can actually alter aerodynamic forces acting upon them, thereby reducing the injury risk when they land. Throughout their flight, colugos glide at a steady pace. Just before landing, however, they perform a special manoeuvre. This move, which essentially uses their “wings” like a parachute, quickly reduces the landing forces and spreads the force of landing out across all four of the animal’s limbs.
The scientists believe their work could be used to help aeronautical engineers. Spence said: "Despite being common throughout their natural range the Malayan colugo is quite poorly understood because it's hard to measure things about an animal that moves around at night, lives 30 metres up a tree, and can glide 100 metres away from you in an arbitrary direction in 10 seconds. Our new sensing backpacks have given us an insight into the behaviour of these fascinating creatures."
Info from Telegraph
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Comments
Lisa (not verified) says:
Feb 7th, 2008 at 1am
So in other words...
Scientists are getting too lazy to produce their creative way of finding this out and instead use have baked and cheap ideas....
Occam's Chainsaw (not verified) says:
Feb 7th, 2008 at 3am
Is this some kind of a weird paid advertisement?
Accelerometers have been used in many applications for ages and somehow you connect them to the Wii.
Do LED flashlights also contain "Chevrolet Corvette parts", since the latter has LED taillights?
Patrick (not verified) says:
Feb 7th, 2008 at 3pm
So they strapped an accelerometer and some flash memory to a flying lemur. This article is daft, are you being paid by Nintendo or Apple? Every mp3 player contains "a memory chip similar to an iPod", why name drop?
R (not verified) says:
Feb 7th, 2008 at 3pm
The backpack used an accelerometer much like the one used in a Nintendo Wii controller and coupled it with a memory chip similar to an iPod.
They are just descriptive terms which are associating science technologies with leading edge consumer based technologies.
Insomniak (not verified) says:
Feb 7th, 2008 at 4pm
So in other words…Scientists are getting too lazy to produce their creative way of finding this out and instead use have baked and cheap ideas….
Why is that a bad thing? You just described how a lot of our greatest inventions in history occurred, from some guy modifying the original use of other inventions. You’re just jealous you’re not as smart as this guy.
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~johnny/projects/wii/
Gashi (not verified) says:
Feb 7th, 2008 at 5pm
Idiots, they used the comparison to Wii and iPod because 95% of the population doesnt understand what an accelerometer or a capacitance based memory chip is. By saying "parts like a Wii remote and iPod" the scientists catch the public's eye and possibly gain funding for their research. Research doesn't just happen, its funded by private and public grants, and without reason and interest to continue the study there is no money with which to further investigate these things. They are trying to explain their methods in laymen's terms to reach the public.
You are all Idiots (not verified) says:
Feb 8th, 2008 at 6pm
So in other words…Scientists are getting too lazy to produce their creative way of finding this out and instead use have baked and cheap ideas….
Are you daft? On a limited budget with limited time, most scientists would not have the time and money to develop a gyroscope and bluetooth combination.
Believe it or not, consumer electronics companies have developed technologies that scientists use regularly. Its not "cheap"... its damn smart.
Willis (not verified) says:
Your mom is a lay man.