First published online July 25, 2005
Journal of Experimental Biology 208, 2939-2949 (2005)
Published by The Company of Biologists 2005
doi: 10.1242/jeb.01733
Aquatic wing flapping at low Reynolds numbers: swimming kinematics of the Antarctic pteropod, Clione antarctica
Brendan J. Borrell1,*,
Jeremy A. Goldbogen1 and
Robert Dudley1,2
1 Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley, CA
94720, USA
2 Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, P.O. Box 2072, Balboa, Republic
of Panama

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Fig. 1. Wingtip motion for a Clione antarctica during a single wingbeat
cycle (ai) from lateral (above) and dorsal (below) perspectives. Mean
relative velocity of the body (blue arrows) and mean body acceleration vectors
(red arrows) are averaged from data for eight individuals. The external
coordinate system is shown indicating the x-, y- and
z-axes. The body coordinate system is indicated by the
y'- and z'-axes, but, in this example, the
x'-axis is not shown because it is coincident with the
x-axis. The origin of the body coordinate system is at the near wing
base.
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Fig. 2. (A) Right lateral and dorsal views of wingtip displacement relative to the
wing base for Clione antarctica (individual no. 1) swimming at
0.3°C. (B) Wingtip position vs time for two wingbeat cycles.
Circles represent the position of digitized data points, and plotted lines are
spline functions fitted to time series data. P, posterior; A, anterior; D,
dorsal; V, ventral; R, right; L, left.
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Fig. 3. Relative wingtip position and relative body angle during a complete
wingbeat cycle for Clione antarctica. Thin lines are interpolated
points from a spline function fitted to digitized kinematic data from
individual sequences. Thick red lines represent the mean value for all
kinematic sequences. P, posterior; A, anterior; D, dorsal; V, ventral; R,
right; L, left.
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Fig. 4. Kinematic parameters as a function of non-dimensional body velocity in
Clione antarctica. (A) Angle of attack ( ) increases with
non-dimensional velocity (r2=0.741,
F1,6=17.155, P=0.0061); (B) stroke plane angle
during the power phase (ßps) increases with non-dimensional
velocity (r2=0.725, F1,6=15.780,
P=0.0073); (C) angle of ascent during the power phase
( ps) increases with non-dimensional velocity
(r2=0.701, F1,6=14.099,
P=0.0095); (D) kinematic definitions of angle of attack, stroke plane
angle during the power phase, and ascent angle.
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Fig. 5. Lateral projection of the geometric center of area of a Clione
antarctica (individual no. 1) in vertical ascent during two complete
wingbeat cycles. Arrows denote: a, the beginning of the power phase of the
upstroke; b, recovery phase of the upstroke; c, power phase of downstroke; d,
recovery phase of the downstroke; and e, the end of the stroke cycle.
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Fig. 6. Foreaft acceleration of the body in relation to three wingtip
variables: foreaft velocity, foreaft acceleration, and
transverse (lateral and dorsoventral components) velocity. Thin lines are
estimated from the second derivative of a spline function fitted to the
digitized kinematics from individual sequences. Thick lines represent mean
values averaged across all eight sequences.
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Fig. 7. Timing of kinematic events in relation to foreaft accelerations of
the body based on data from eight Clione individuals as shown in
Fig. 6. Inflection points not
unambiguously identified were excluded from the analysis. The central line
indicates the median value, the grey box delimits the upper and lower
quartiles, and whiskers indicate the range of the remaining data.
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Fig. 8. Dorsoventral components of wingtip velocity and acceleration, and
rotational acceleration of the body for ascending Clione antarctica.
Thin lines are estimated from the first derivative of a spline function fitted
to digitized kinematic data from individual sequences. Thick red lines
represent the mean values averaged across all eight sequences.
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Fig. 9. Timing of kinematic events in relation to angular accelerations of the body
based on data from the eight Clione individuals shown in
Fig. 8. Inflection points not
unambiguously identified were excluded from analysis. The central line
indicates the median value, the grey box delimits the upper and lower
quartiles, and whiskers indicate the range of the remaining data.
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© The Company of Biologists Ltd 2005