A Free-Flight Simulation of Insect Flapping Flight

In insect flapping flight, non-equilibrium flight conditions such as takeoffs and uncoordinated turn are difficult to investigate with experiments or quasi-steady analysis. Here we develop a simplified rigid body dynamics solver with 6 degrees of freedom (DOF), by utilizing unit quaternions. A free-flight simulator of an insect flapping flight is then built up by coupling the dynamics solver with an in-house CFD solver, which is specified for simulating unsteady flapping-wing aerodynamics. Simulation of the hovering flight of a fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) is achieved by manually manipulating three kinematic parameters, wingbeat amplitude, mean positional angle, and stroke plane angle relative to body (anatomical stroke plane angle).

[1]  Ellington,et al.  A computational fluid dynamic study of hawkmoth hovering , 1998, The Journal of experimental biology.

[2]  H Liu,et al.  Size effects on insect hovering aerodynamics: an integrated computational study , 2009, Bioinspiration & biomimetics.

[3]  Hao Liu,et al.  Integrated modeling of insect flight: From morphology, kinematics to aerodynamics , 2009, J. Comput. Phys..

[4]  Wei Shyy,et al.  Near wake vortex dynamics of a hovering hawkmoth , 2009 .

[5]  Mao Sun,et al.  Hovering of model insects: simulation by coupling equations of motion with Navier–Stokes equations , 2009, Journal of Experimental Biology.

[6]  T. Hedrick,et al.  Wingbeat Time and the Scaling of Passive Rotational Damping in Flapping Flight , 2009, Science.

[7]  Mao Sun,et al.  Dynamic flight stability of hovering insects , 2007 .

[8]  M. Dickinson,et al.  Performance trade-offs in the flight initiation of Drosophila , 2008, Journal of Experimental Biology.

[9]  Richard M. Murray,et al.  Flight Dynamics and Control of Evasive Maneuvers: The Fruit Fly's Takeoff , 2009, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering.

[10]  Michael H Dickinson,et al.  Wing and body motion during flight initiation in Drosophila revealed by automated visual tracking , 2009, Journal of Experimental Biology.

[11]  Yosuke Ueno,et al.  Flight Simulation of Taketombo Based on Computational Fluid Dynamics and Computational Flight Dynamics , 2008 .

[12]  R. Ramamurti,et al.  A computational investigation of the three-dimensional unsteady aerodynamics of Drosophila hovering and maneuvering , 2007, Journal of Experimental Biology.

[13]  Hao Liu,et al.  Near- and far-field aerodynamics in insect hovering flight: an integrated computational study , 2008, Journal of Experimental Biology.

[14]  John Guckenheimer,et al.  Discovering the flight autostabilizer of fruit flies by inducing aerial stumbles , 2010, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[15]  M. Dickinson,et al.  The aerodynamic effects of wing rotation and a revised quasi-steady model of flapping flight. , 2002, The Journal of experimental biology.

[16]  T L Hedrick,et al.  Flight control in the hawkmoth Manduca sexta: the inverse problem of hovering , 2006, Journal of Experimental Biology.