Zhao Jieliang, Zhu Fei, Yan Shaoze
Division of Intelligent and Biomechanical Systems, State Key Laboratory of Tribology, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.
J Insect Sci. 2018 Mar 1;18(2). doi: 10.1093/jisesa/iey038.
Insects are well equipped in walking on complex three-dimensional terrain, allowing them to overcome obstacles or catch prey. However, the gait transition for insects steering on a wall remains unexplored. Here, we find that honeybees adopted a tetrapod gait to change direction when climbing a wall. On the contrary to the common tripod gait, honeybees propel their body forward by synchronously stepping with both middle legs and then both front legs. This process ensures the angle of the central axis of the honeybee to be consistent with the crawling direction. Interestingly, when running in an alternating tripod gait, the central axis of honeybee sways around the center of mass under alternating tripod gait to maintain stability. Experimental results show that tripod, tetrapod, and random gaits result in the amazing consensus harmony on the climbing speed and gait stability, whether climbing on a smooth wall or walking on smooth ground.
昆虫在复杂的三维地形上行走能力出色，这使它们能够克服障碍或捕捉猎物。然而，昆虫在墙壁上转向时的步态转换仍未得到探索。在这里，我们发现蜜蜂在爬墙时采用四足步态来改变方向。与常见的三足步态相反，蜜蜂通过同时移动两条中腿然后两条前腿来推动身体向前。这个过程确保了蜜蜂身体中轴线的角度与爬行方向一致。有趣的是，当以交替三足步态奔跑时，蜜蜂的中轴线在交替三足步态下围绕质心摆动以保持稳定。实验结果表明，无论是在光滑墙壁上爬行还是在光滑地面上行走，三足、四足和随机步态在攀爬速度和步态稳定性方面都达成了惊人的一致和谐。
