Sightings: Symmetric Bat Flight

How do bats fly? What are the aerodynamic conditions around their wings? And how do you visualize all that? I did a short interview with David Laidlaw (PDF), who has collaborated with physicists, biologists, fluid mechanics experts, and others, to create a poster that won last year's NSF Visualization Challenge. The interview was done for American Scientist's Sightings column, which I have been invited to write.

I am taking this over from Felice Frankel, which is not an easy task. I have decided to skirt direct comparisons by changing the format and branching out into more InfoVis-y topics (though always with a scientific application), visualization criticism, etc.

American Scientist is published every other month, and I will be posting pointers to the articles here when they appear. Sightings is available free of charge in a web version and even as a very nice PDF (see links above).

Posted by Robert Kosara on August 6, 2008. Filed under Sightings.