BBC News: “Beetle Defence Inspires University of Leeds Research”

The amazing Bombardier beetle has long been a favorite of intelligent design advocates, who ask how the insect’s amazing self-defense mechanism could have arisen in stepwise fashion. Now, researchers have imitated that incredible mechanism.

When threatened, the Bombardier beetle can expel stinky, toxic steam with high accuracy at a predator, giving the beetle time to escape. Scientists at the University of Leeds, with support from Swedish Biomimetics 3000, recently received an award for their work studying and copying the beetle’s defensive mechanism.

The researchers first endeavored to fully understand the method by which the beetle creates the toxic explosion. Then, a scaled-up man-made simulation was designed that uses special techniques to shoot liquids up to 13 ft (4 m) away. The technology in the simulation allows the researchers to precisely control various aspects of the spray, including droplet size, temperature, and velocity. The device is also environmentally friendly, as the sprays are based on water. (Most aerosol sprays are based on environmentally unfriendly propellants.)

Andy McIntosh, the professor of thermodynamics and combustion theory who headed the team, noted, “Nobody had studied the beetle from a physics and engineering perspective as we did, and we didn’t appreciate how much we would learn from it.” The team foresees potential applications for the device in everything from needle-free injections to fire extinguishers.

We often conclude our reports on scientists who are imitating God’s designs with the sad note that they attribute those designs to evolution, not God. But that isn’t the case this time. In fact, the name Andy McIntosh may sound familiar, because McIntosh is not only an award-winning scientist, but also a young-earth creationist. The research therefore provides not only another fascinating look at the incredible complexity and sophistication of biological creation, but also a reminder that one can be a Bible-believing young-earth creationist and a top-notch scientist at the same time.

(In other news of God’s creation inspiring engineer’s designs, scientists have developed a camera that can see like a trilobite!)

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Ants can lift weight 100 times heavier than their own body

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The image above is not a fake, not photoshop contest or something. It's real! The photo above shows a real ant lifting weight 100 times heavier than his own body upside down with his jaws. The 500 mg marks on the weight is not a joke. Its mean that ant (weighted 5 mg) lifting 500 mg weight objects (100 times heavier). If the scale is equated, the circumstances is same as a man with 75 kg (150 lbs) lifting 7,500 kg (15,000 lbs) weight. That is impossible, right? Who the hell can lift 7.5 tons of weight with bare hand?

But ants does, they can lift something 100 times heavier than their own bodies. The more amazing fact is that ant can lift that kind of weight while they sticking on wall or something. On the picture above, that ant is carrying 500 mg weight while he stick on the glass upside down. He can sticking on the shiny and slippery glass surface while lifting weight. How the ants do that? According to Dr Endelin from Cambridge: "Ants can change the size and shape of the pads on their feet depending on the load they are carrying. If they have to carry heavy loads they increase the contact area, and when they need to run they decrease it."

The ant's legs also play a part in the insect's stickiness by making clever use of what scientists call "peeling forces". "If you think about peeling off sticky tape from a surface, it's easiest when you peel at a steep, rather than a shallow, angle. Ants use the same mechanism: when they want to stick, they keep their legs at a shallow angle relative to the surface, and when they want to release their legs they increase this angle and peel off easily," he says.

As well as shedding light on ants' seemingly gravity-defying feats, the Cambridge research could help scientists develop better glues. According to Dr Endelin: "The pads on ants' feet are self-cleaning and can stick to almost any type of surface. No man-made glue or adhesive system can match this. Understanding how animals can control their adhesive systems should help us come up with 'clever' adhesives in the future."

[Source: University of Cambridge]

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The video that proves Intelligent Design

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Seeing is believing, and they say that a picture is worth a thousand words. Over at Creation.com, Brian Thomas has posted a fascinating article entitled, ATP synthase: majestic molecular machine made by a mastermind. ATP synthase is an enzyme that synthesizes an energy-rich compound, ATP (adenosine triphosphate), which is used by almost every biochemical process in the body. ATP synthase is also the world’s tiniest rotary motor, and it operates at near 100% efficiency, which is far greater than that of any man-made motor. In his article, Brian Thomas does an excellent job of describing the workings of this enzyme and of exposing the inadequacies of proposed evolutionary explanations for its origin.

But don’t take my word for it. Have a look at this video by Creation.com, and you’ll see at once that ATP synthase is the product of design. It’ll only take 86 seconds of your valuable time.

As Jonathan Sarfati explains in another video, entitled Evolution Vs ATP Synthase – Molecular Machine:

You couldn’t have life unless you had this motor to produce the energy currency, so it looks like this motor must have been there right from the beginning, and I’d say that because this motor is so much better, so much tinier and more efficient than anything we can design, … the Designer of the motor is far more intelligent than any motor designer we have today too.

My sentiments exactly. Judge for yourself. You might like to have a look at these links here and here, on Uncommon Descent, where ATP synthase has been highlighted previously, as evidence for Intelligent Design.

I’d like to thank Bornagain77, a regular contributor to Uncommon Descent, for bringing this video to my attention, and also Ashby Camp of True.Origin.

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More Switches Than the Internet

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Array tomography, yet another new biological imaging technology, is yielding early results. Click here, for example, to see a video rendition of a mouse cortex. Here’s how one writer described the new results:

The human brain is truly awesome. A typical, healthy one houses some 200 billion nerve cells, which are connected to one another via hundreds of trillions of synapses. Each synapse functions like a microprocessor, and tens of thousands of them can connect a single neuron to other nerve cells. In the cerebral cortex alone, there are roughly 125 trillion synapses, which is about how many stars fill 1,500 Milky Way galaxies.

[…]

Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have spent the past few years engineering a new imaging model, which they call array tomography, in conjunction with novel computational software, to stitch together image slices into a three-dimensional image that can be rotated, penetrated and navigated.

[…]

They found that the brain’s complexity is beyond anything they’d imagined, almost to the point of being beyond belief, says Stephen Smith, a professor of molecular and cellular physiology and senior author of the paper describing the study:

And as Smith explains:

One synapse, by itself, is more like a microprocessor—with both memory-storage and information-processing elements—than a mere on/off switch. In fact, one synapse may contain on the order of 1,000 molecular-scale switches. A single human brain has more switches than all the computers and routers and Internet connections on Earth.

Evolutionists are certain, however, that all of this—and all the rest of biology by the way—just happened to arise on its own. They can’t explain how, but they’re absolutely certain it is a fact. After all, any other explanation is not scientific and in any case chimpanzees and humans have way too much in common. Anyway the world is too evil and god never would have made all those beetles, so evolution must be true. With evolutionists, it's all about philosophy and theology. Religion drives science and it matters.

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Insects Compute Optimal Flight Plans

Anyone who travels much by air knows that pilots try to ride the wind. Flights may even deviate substantially from the shortest-distance route if the wind is strong enough elsewhere. But of course the wind is not likely moving exactly toward your destination. Add to this the fact that the wind also varies with altitude, and the problem of designing the optimal route of flight becomes highly complex.

It is a problem in the calculus of variations (optimizing functionals rather than mere functions) and is analogous to the optics problem of predicting the path of light through a medium with variant refractive index. But this approach requires analytical wind fields, described with functions, rather than numerically derived winds described, for instance, on a grid. In practice the optimal routing problem is solved using various iterative methods. Amazingly, migratory insects also solve this type of problem.

Research using entomological radar has found that migratory insects such as butterflies and moths perform their own flight planning in order to optimize their flights across continents. They select the right time to ride the wind, and they determine the right altitude and flight heading to reach their destination (rather than where the wind is going). As one of the researchers explained:

Migratory butterflies and moths have evolved an amazing capacity to use favourable tailwinds. By flying at the heights where the wind currents are fastest, migratory moths can travel between their summer and winter grounds in just a few nights.

And what is the evidence that this amazing capacity evolved? What mutations produced it? And how did evolution create the ability of the insects know when to start their journey and where they should go? You know the answer: “We’re not sure but we know they evolved because evolution is a fact.” Religion drives science and it matters.

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Chickens Have Cellular Sunglasses

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When light enters your eye it triggers a sequence of actions, ultimately causing a signal to be sent to your brain. Even a mere single photon can be detected in your vision system. It all starts with a photon interacting with a light-sensitive chromophore molecule. The interaction causes the chromophore to change configuration and this, in turn, influences the large, trans-membrane rhodopsin protein to which the chromophore is attached. This is just the beginning of the cellular signal transduction cascade. But before any of this begins, in some species the incoming light has already been filtered and focused.

The chromophore photoisomerization is the beginning of a remarkable cascade that causes action potentials to be triggered in the optic nerve. In response to the chromophore photoisomerization, the rhodopsin causes the activation of hundreds of transducin molecules. These, in turn, cause the activation of cGMP phosphodiesterase (by removing its inhibitory subunit), an enzyme that degrades the cyclic nucleotide, cGMP.

A single photon can result in the activation of hundreds of transducins, leading to the degradation of hundreds of thousands of cGMP molecules. cGMP molecules serve to open non selective ion channels in the membrane, so reduction in cGMP concentration serves to close these channels. This means that millions of sodium ions per second are shut out of the cell, causing a voltage change across the membrane. This hyperpolarization of the cell membrane causes a reduction in the release of neurotransmitter, the chemical that interacts with the nearby nerve cell, in the synaptic region of the cell. This reduction in neurotransmitter release ultimately causes an action potential to arise in the nerve cell.

All this because a single photon entered into the fray. In short order, this light signal is converted into a structural signal, more structural signals, a chemical concentration signal, back to a structural signal, and then back to a chemical concentration signal leading to a voltage signal which then leads back to a chemical concentration signal. There is, of course, a wealth of yet more detail which makes the information conversion process far more complicated.

Optical oil drops

And there is a seemingly endless stream of variations on this cascade. One fascinating variation is the use of special oil to filter and focus the incoming light before it ever reaches the first step of exciting the light-sensitive chromophore molecule. In chickens, for example, these brightly colored oil droplets seem to improve color discrimination as they focus the light toward the target chromophore molecules.

And these droplets are not just any kind of oil. The oil and its optical properties are finely tuned and specific to the different types of light sensitive cells. In fact the oil provides a convenient method for determining the cell type, which allowed researchers to map the optimal pattern the different cell types fall into. It is all part of what one writer called “a masterpiece of biological design.”

Evolutionists describe this as a consequence of evolutionary pressure:

Our results indicate that the evolutionary pressures that gave rise to the avian retina’s various adaptations for enhanced color discrimination also acted to fine-tune its spatial sampling of color and luminance.

Evolutionary, or selective, pressure is an internal contradiction in evolutionary thought. One can hardly blame evolutionists for their use of such action themes. It sounds better than the just-add-water account which holds that random biological variation produced nature’s marvels. But in fact there can be no such pressure in evolution’s the-world-is-a-fluke hypothesis.

The whole idea in evolutionary theory is that random mutations are, well, random. Biological variation is random with respect to need. There can be no “pressure” to produce any smart designs. And the evolutionist’s hole card, natural selection, doesn’t help. It only kills off the failures (of which there must have been a great many). Every mutation, one after the other, leading to nature’s gems such as the fine-tuned oil droplet in light sensitive cells, must have occurred for no reason. Only after they occurred could natural selection appreciate the brilliance of these random events. And that’s a fact. Religion drives science, and it matters.

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The Fly’s Adaptive Aerodynamics

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Recent experiments have revealed that when perturbed in flight, a fruit fly can recover its heading to within 2 degrees in less than a tenth of a second. Here’s how the researchers describe the results:

Just as the Wright brothers implemented controls to achieve stable airplane flight, flying insects have evolved behavioral strategies that ensure recovery from flight disturbances.

This is yet another example of evolutionary euphemism. Recovery from flight disturbances is a complex, fine-tuned capability integrating sensors, algorithms and actuators. Not the stuff of random mutations. So the evolutionary euphemism compares it with the Wright brothers and their flying machines.

Pioneering studies performed on tethered and dissected insects demonstrate that the sensory, neurological, and musculoskeletal systems play important roles in flight control.

Indeed, sensory, neurological, and musculoskeletal systems need to be tightly coordinated.

High-speed video and a new motion tracking method capture the aerial “stumble,” and we discover that flies respond to gentle disturbances by accurately returning to their original orientation. These insects take advantage of a stabilizing aerodynamic influence and active torque generation to recover their heading to within 2 degrees in less than 60 ms. To explain this recovery behavior, we form a feedback control model that includes the fly’s ability to sense body rotations, process this information, and actuate the wing motions that generate corrective aerodynamic torque.

The fly’s sensors are tiny sensors known as halteres, structures that evolutionists have considered to be rudimentary—evolutionary leftovers. Now we’re told they just happened to evolve fantastic gyroscopic sensing capabilities, which just happened to be sent to the fly’s neurological circuits, which just happened to compute meaningful flight control maneuvers, which just happened to be sent to the fly’s musculoskeletal system. No wonder evolutionists resort to euphemisms.

Thus, like early man-made aircraft and modern fighter jets, the fruit fly employs an automatic stabilization scheme that reacts to short time-scale disturbances.

An automatic stabilization scheme for short time-scale disturbances that just happened to arise? Religion drives science, and it matters.

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Stem Cells of the Adult Kind Steal the Headlines

Original.

Nov 18, 2010 — Stories about stem cell research need to be divided into two sections: those about adult stem cells (AS), which have no ethical ramifications, and stories about embryonic stem cells (ES), which raise many issues about the sanctity of human life. As usual, most of the actual clinical progress is being made with adult stem cells (cf. 10/04/2010, 08/06/2010; search on "stem cells" for many more entries).

Adult Stem Cells

1. Culture triple crown: Scientists at UC San Diego have provided a perfect environment for the growth and culture of adult stem cells, according to Science Daily. “Bioengineers from the University of California, San Diego have achieved the ‘Triple Crown’ of stem cell culture -- they created an artificial environment for stem cells that simultaneously provides the chemical, mechanical and electrical cues necessary for stem cell growth and differentiation,” the article began. “Building better microenvironments for nurturing stem cells is critical for realizing the promises of stem-cell-based regenerative medicine, including cartilage for joint repair, cardiac cells for damaged hearts, and healthy skeletal myoblasts for muscular dystrophy patients. The advance could also lead to better model systems for fundamental stem cell research. The article said nothing about embryonic stem cells.
2. Bandage for a bleeding heart: In another Science Daily report, researchers at the University of Cincinnati have shown that an injection of stem cells into animal hearts, with the appropriate expression molecules, leads to repair of damaged heart tissue. They used induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) in their experiments.
3. Fat for the heart: Stem cells derived from fat may be safe in humans, said another story in Science Daily.
4. Arthritis hope: Stem cells from umbilical cords may be used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, announced PhysOrg.
5. Stem cells on the brain: Scientists at Duke University are trying to understand how stem cells in the brain decide to renew themselves or differentiate into neurons, according to PhysOrg.
6. Building stem cell muscle: PhysOrg announced hope for keeping muscles strong as we age: “A University of Colorado at Boulder-led study shows that specific types of stem cells transplanted into the leg muscles of mice prevented the loss of muscle function and mass that normally occurs with aging, a finding with potential uses in treating humans with chronic, degenerative muscle diseases.”
7. Saving limbs: Some people get cardiovascular disease so serious, the only option is amputation of a limb. Science Daily just announced a treatment that might some day save 100,000 limbs a year by injecting the patient’s own stem cells into the damaged area, to “stimulate new blood vessel formation in ischemic limbs, which can improve perfusion and salvage function.” The lead researcher at Northwestern Medicine was clearly excited about the hope this provides. “As study of stem cells continues, I believe we’re on the verge of a rebirth in the practice of medicine,” said Douglas Losordo, M.D.. “Using a patient’s own cells to regenerate their body has enormous potential to treat conditions that have previously been considered irreversible.”

Embryonic Stem Cells

1. Art or science? The only recent stem cell story in the popular science press was this one from Science Daily: “Embryonic Stem Cell Culturing Grows from Art to Science.” Scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found a more reliable way to culture ES cells. Is anything good being done with them? Not according to the article: “At present, human embryonic stem cells are cultured mostly for use in research settings.”
2. Regulators without Rx: An abstract in Nature (11 Nov 2010) discussed research in Singapore trying to identify all the transcription factors that regulate embryonic stem cells. There was no mention of any application to help human beings.

One other recent news story did not make it clear whether ES or AS cells were being discussed. Live Science and PhysOrg both announced the first stem cell trial by injection of stem cells into a woman’s brain at the University of Glasgow. No results were announced. Joni Eareckson Tada was interviewed on the Frank Pastore radio show Weds. evening (see her website and listen to her story in the documentary, The Case for Faith). This long-suffering quadriplegic woman who has championed the needs of the disabled would, it seems, have plenty of reasons from a secular perspective to support ES stem cell research – if she thought for a minute they were ethical and provided hope. Instead, she pled earnestly against ES stem cell research as a matter of conscience, because cutting up human embryos, which according to the Bible and genetics are human persons, violates the sanctity of human life. She applauded the many wonderful advances happening in adult stem cell research, arguing that they presented no ethical issues.
Joni, who according to World Magazine has most recently been battling severe pain with breast cancer, on top of decades of paralysis, said all that needs to be said about this issue, with a credibility most of us lack. For more information, see the policy statement by Steve Bundy about stem cell research on her Joni & Friends ministry website, and her book Life in the Balance that discusses Biblical answers for the issues of our day, including stem cell research. Joni also has a DVD entitled Lives in the Balance: the Stem Cell Debate that specifically addresses the issue.

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Ferocious tiger in the water

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White tigers are very rarely found in the wild. In about 100 yeas only 12 white tigers have been seen in the wild in India. They are almost extinct and most of the ones living are in captivity, mostly in zoos. This specific tiger is neither an albino nor a seperate subspecies of the tiger. They are beautifully white colored and have black stripes. It has blue eyes and a pink nose. It also has white colored fur. The white tiger is born to a bengal tiger that has the gene needed for white coloring. A pure white tiger has no stripes and are totally white.

Some fascinating pictures of a ferocious tiger in the water.

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The scariest and weirdest spiders on the planet

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Sydney funnel-web spider (Atrax robustus)

Funnel-webs are one of the three most dangerous spiders in the world and are regarded by some to be the most dangerous. Wandering males are thought to be responsible for the majority of fatal bites to humans, however this has not been proven. Males are aggressive and tend to wander looking for receptive females of their kind for mating.

Goliath bird eating spider (Theraphosa blondi)

The goliath bird eating spider is an arachnid belonging to the tarantula family and is the largest spider in the world. The spider was named by explorers from the Victorian era, who reported the sighting to the Western world after witnessing the spider devouring a hummingbird.

Redback spider (Latrodectus hasselti)

Resembling the black widow spider, the redback is a member of the genus Latrodectus (widow family) found throughout the world. Females measure about a centimetre in length while the male is only 3 to 4 milimetres long. The redback spider is one of few animals which display sexual cannibalism while mating.

Crab spider (Ozyptila praticola)

Most often found on flowers, lying in ambush for prey, crab spiders do not build webs to trap prey but are active hunters much like jumping spiders. Like crabs, these spiders move sideways and backwards more easily than forwards.

Camel spiders (Solifugae)

These terrifying creatures became infamous when American soldiers who had returned home from Iraq told of cat size spiders that could bite chunks out of human flesh. Solifugae are not actually true spiders but belong to a distinct arachnid order.

Black Widow (Latrodectus)

This sinister creature posseses venom 15 times more potent than that of a rattlesnake. Due to the great geographical range of the black widow, the highest number of deaths world-wide are caused by members of their genus.

Brown recluse spider (Loxosceles reclusa)

Brown recluse bites produce severe dermonecrotic lesions and severe systemic symptoms, including organ damage and even fatalities. Bites have been known to form a necrotizing ulcer that destroys soft tissue and may take months to heal, leaving deep scars. The damaged tissue will become gangrenous and eventually slough away.

Argiope aetherea

This large orb-web is often referred to as the St Andrew's Cross spider due to it's characteristic cross-shaped web. This species displays sexual size dimorphism, with females being many times larger than males.

Nephila clavata (Joro spider)

This colorful arachnid is a golden orb-web spider. Researchers in Japan have created a silk thread that is stronger, softer and more durable than conventional silk by genetically modifying silkworms with Nephilia drag line genes. Spider socks, stockings and fishing lines are expected to appear on the market within years.

Chilean rose tarantula (Grammostola rosea)

Although they look fightening, these tarantulas make brilliant pets. Females have been known to live as long as 20 years with the possibility that they may live considerably longer.

Wolf spider (Hogna helluo)

So called due to their ability to run down their prey, wolf spiders depend on their eyesight to hunt. Their sense of touch is acute. A bite may cause some itching to a human, but nothing deadly or major.

Goldenrod crab spider (Misumena vatia)

Goldenrod spiders are mainly found in North America and have the ability to change colour from white to yellow and back again. The colour change is made possible by the spider secreting a liquid yellow pigment into the outer cell layer of the body.

Zebra spider (Salticus scenicus)

Zebra spiders are often noted for their 'curiosity' when observed, many seem aware of their audience and seem to respond by raising their head and looking back at the person. This spider uses its four pairs of large eyes to locate prey and it's jumping ability to pounce and capture it.

Huntsman spider (Sparassidae)

Huntsman spiders can grow up to a legspan of 12 inches and will bite if provoked. Huntsman spiders are not deadly to humans though, the victim will suffer only minor swelling and localised pain, recovering in a day or two.

Mexican redknee tarantula (Brachypelma Smithi)

In the wild, the redknee will consume almost any kind of arthropod, small lizard, or small rodent that they can overpower and immobilize with their venom. After moulting, it will emerge from its exoskeleton leaving the old skin behind, looking like a second spider.

Barn spider (Araneus cavaticus)

This spider was made famous by the book, Charlotte's Web. The book's spider was called Charlotte A. Cavatica, and the barn spider's scientific name is Araneus cavaticus.

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Morning Sickness

Psalm 71:6 By You I have been upheld from my birth; You are He who took me out of my mother's womb. My praise shall be continually of You."

More than 75 percent of all women in their first trimester of pregnancy suffer some form of morning sickness. More than half become physically sick. While it may not help a woman with morning sickness feel better, it might help to know that morning sickness may serve a good purpose.

A University of California biologist has concluded that morning sickness may actually be the body's way of protecting the developing child. Margie Profet spent six years studying diets, birth defects and the level of natural toxins in our food. Most food has a natural, low concentration of poisons. For example, plants make poisons to protect their leaves from marauding insects. Normally these poisons are so weak that they are completely harmless to us. However, the newly developing infant is extremely susceptible to these low levels of toxins until about the eighth week of development. Naturally occurring chemicals in our environment can cause birth defects and even death to the vulnerable infant. When the body detects a level of toxins dangerous to the developing child, it may use morning sickness to rid the body of them.

Profet mentions other studies that showed that women who get nauseous and vomit during early pregnancy have lower rates of miscarriage than women who don't get sick.

The final scientific opinion isn't in yet. However, morning sickness may indeed be God's safety valve to protect the sensitive, developing child from harm.

Prayer:

I thank You, dear Father, for the wonderful way in which You formed me in my mother's womb. I realize that as I was formed, You hand-made me no less than You originally formed the first human being, Adam. In Jesus' Name. Amen.

Notes:

"Morning sickness may protect fetus from toxins." Minneapolis Star Tribune, June 13. p. 7A.

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Lotus Glass Repels Water, Dirt, Bacteria

09/23/2009
Sept 23, 2009 — Imagine never having to wash your windows again. That would be a huge boon not only for window washers on skyscrapers, but for astronauts on the space shuttle or space station. It may become a reality, thanks to the lotus plant.

Science Daily reported on work by a company in Atlanta that has developed a transparent coating for glass that renders it impervious to dirt and water. The secret: imitating the surface of a lotus leaf, which “contains innumerable tiny spikes that greatly reduce the area on which water and dirt can attach.”

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center is taking a keen interest in this technology, because it can “prevent dirt from accumulating on the surfaces of spacesuits, scientific instruments, robotic rovers, solar array panels and other hardware used to gather scientific data or carry out exploratory activities on other objects in the solar system.” The latest work seeks to manufacture the material such that it can withstand the harsh space environment.

For us earthlings, the applications of lotus-leaf surface coatings to everyday objects – eyeglasses, windshields, camera lenses and windows – promises a low-maintenance, clear view through the looking glass. And there’s an extra benefit. The material also repels bacteria. Think of how hospitals could stay more hygienic with lotus-like surfaces on walls, windows and equipment.

For previous stories on the properties of the lotus leaf, see 10/17/2006, 01/18/2005 and 10/27/2004.

This all began when someone looked at lotus leaves in the rain and noticed how the water beads up and runs off, leaving a clean surface. Look around at nature and notice what other technologies have already been designed and could be applied to human needs. (You may want to get an early start if you manufacture windshield wipers.) There’s a bright future in biomimetics, no thanks to Darwin.

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Floppy Wings = Efficient Flight

Original Article

By Michael Torrice

ScienceNOW Daily News
17 September 2009

Next time you're on an airplane, check out the wings. Every bolt and rivet is flush with the surface, creating an extremely smooth shape. The wings of the desert locust are not nearly as sleek: They're covered with ridges and veins, and they twist and deform as they flap. But these features make the insect an efficient flier, albeit at lower speeds, according to a new study.

Biologists and engineers have long known that insect wings are more complex than just flat, rigid flapping plates. But most models of insect flight have treated them this way because scientists needed to simplify their calculations and lacked a detailed picture of how the wings actually work.

To produce a better model, biomechanicist Adrian Thomas of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom and colleagues came up with a new way to capture wing-shape changes during flight. The team set up four high-speed video cameras around a desert locust (Schistocerca gregaria) and recorded its flapping. Each camera followed more than 100 dots marked on the bug's wings during each stroke. The researchers then used data on how those points moved to create a three-dimensional computer model of the locust. Simulations with the virtual insect closely matched experimental data on real locust wing air flow and forces.

With a validated model, Thomas's team members started erasing wing details. In one simulation, they smoothed out the virtual wings' ridges and camber--the curve from the front of the wing to the back. In a second, they removed the wing's ability to twist as it flaps, effectively making it flat and rigid. These two models were less-efficient fliers than real locusts: The curved, twisting wings of real bugs were about 10% more efficient in producing lift than the camberless wings, and they were 50% more efficient than the flat, rigid model.

In the models of the nontwisting wings, the air flow separates from the wings into vortices that create drag. Locusts avoid these vortices by keeping the angle between the wing and air flow constant. Conserving power by minimizing drag is crucial for desert locusts that sometimes must fly 300 kilometers at a time--orders of magnitude farther than small, battery-powered helicopters can, Thomas says. Engineers trying to design tiny aircrafts "drool" at the insect's endurance, he says.

Previous research has focused more on the forces insect wings produce, says biologist Douglas Altshuler of the University of California, Riverside. "Considering how wing shape affects power cost of flight is really valuable and a good way to focus future research."

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Desert creatures inspire ‘SandBot’

Good article in how scientists are learning from God's Design.

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Creatures that Defy Evolution - Part 1/3

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The Designer Apparently Designs Like Humans Do

Here at UD we’ve heard over and over again that unless we “know” who the Designer is, then we can’t infer design. For example, if we were to argue that we’ve never seen the ancient Native Americans who fashioned arrowheads from stone, yet we are able to infer design in arrowheads nonetheless, the Darwinian side would respond saying, “Yes, but that’s because the Native Americans are humans like ourselves.”

PhysOrg.com has an article about the microRNA, miR-7, which has been found to regulate a network which brings about uniformity among humans. The article is interesting in itself, but most interesting is this comment by one of the lead authors, Richard W. Carthew:

When something is changed, say the genetic sequence of a molecule or the temperature of the organism, the network responds to compensate for the change and keep things intact. . . . This design is similar to the principle that engineers use to design safety features into products.”

Unless some Darwinist can mount some kind of sensible objection, then I guess we here at UD can safely, and reasonably, conclude that whoever the Designer is, he ‘designs’ like human engineers do. Thusly, the opposite is true: if we find human engineering-like design in biological systems, then we can conclude that we have encountered the/a Designer. And Darwinists can kindly drop this type of argument from their repetoire.

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Scientists Copy God’s Design—Without Giving God Credit (Again!)

This item is available on the Apologetics Press Web site at: http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/3829

AP Content :: In the News

Scientists Copy God’s Design—Without Giving God Credit (Again!)
by Eric Lyons, M.Min.

Man has been constructing airplanes for more than a century. From the Wright brothers’ first gliders to Boeing’s popular 747s to the U.S. military’s stealth bombers, flight technology has become so advanced and high-tech that one can only imagine what aviation engineers will invent next, or whence they will get inspiration for new flight designs.

Wonder no more. According to Live Science senior writer Jeanna Bryner, a team of mechanical and aerospace engineers is designing a new, 32-inch spy plane called Pterodrone. According to the design team,

The next generation of airborne drones won’t just be small and silent. They’ll alter their wing shapes using morphing techniques to squeeze through confined spaces, dive between buildings, zoom under overpasses, land on apartment balconies, or sail along the coastline (Bryner, 2008).

Scientists expect Pterodrone to be equipped with gyroscopes and a GPS, while being able to walk as well as fly.

What exactly inspires a group of highly educated, 21st-century engineers to design such a flying machine? Whence is the self-styled “design team” getting inspiration for their new flying mechanism? Answer: From Tapejara wellnhoferi, a flying reptile that supposedly evolved and went extinct 60+ million years ago. Bryner called the pterosaur “one of the savviest movers of the Cretaceous...a morphing machine” (2008). Based upon their study of the fossil record, scientists believe

Tapejara walked on four legs before rearing up on its two back limbs and running to reach takeoff speed. Once airborne, the beast could cruise at some 19 mph.... [T]o snap up fish food, the reptile would bend the tips of its wings up to form a three-mast sailboat structure with its body. The membranous crest atop its head would have served as the third sail, used as a rudder for steering (Bryner).

Mankind has been building flying machines of all shapes and sizes for more than 100 years. Just when you might think that engineers have perfected aircraft design, they improve by mimicking movements of an extinct pterosaur. Amazingly, though evolutionists admit Tapejara was a “morphing machine,” which had “nerves that served as sensors for temperature, pressure and wind direction,” and now has “inspired” a “design team” to build a “newly designed spy plane” (Bryner, emp. added), allegedly the pterosaur itself was simply the product of millions of years of blind, non-intelligent, random chance processes. So “the real deal,” as Bryner called Tapejara, was not designed by a designer, while the copycat is meticulously “designed” by a “design team” during a “design phase” (Bryner). Once again, we see how far copying kings (bio-inspired scientists) will go to reject and dishonor the Creator, the King of kings (Colossians 1:15-18).

For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man—and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things (Romans 1:20-23).

REFERENCE

Bryner, Jeanna (2008), “New Flying Dinosaur Drone to Look Like Pterodactyl,” Live Science, [On-line], URL: http://www.livescience.com/technology/081008-pterodactyl-revival.html.

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