Feathers may have evolved on dinosaurs to frighten and flush out prey before they were used for flight, say researchers who built a winged robot and used it to scare grasshoppers. Pennaceous feathers, ...

Flying robots have some big advantages over their ground-going counterparts, but they're definitely not very energy-efficient. An experimental new bot addresses that tradeoff by using a wing-assisted ...

Scientists have created a flying robot inspired by how a rhinoceros beetle flaps its wings to take off. The concept is based on how some birds, bats, and other insects tuck their wings against their ...

The sight of birds soaring through the sky has inspired humans for generations before the invention of powered flight in the early 20th century. Still looking to learn from winged animals, a team of ...

The Wright Brothers studied bird flight before they designed the first airplane. Now modern aircraft fly higher and faster than any bird, yet no manufactured device matches the graceful movements and ...

Scientists examined hundreds of birds in museum collections and discovered a suite of feather characteristics that all flying birds have in common. These 'rules' provide clues as to how the dinosaur ...