Supplementary material from "Suction feeding by elephants"
Posted on 2021-05-21 - 03:22
Despite having a trunk that weighs over 100 kg, elephants mainly feed on lightweight vegetation. How do elephants manipulate such small items? In this experimental and theoretical investigation, we filmed elephants at Zoo Atlanta showing that they can use suction to grab food, performing a behaviour that was previously thought to be restricted to fishes. We use a mathematical model to show that an elephant’s nostril size and lung capacity enables them to grab items using the same pressures as the human lung. Ultrasonographic imaging of the elephant sucking viscous fluids show that the elephant’s nostrils dilate up to 30% in radius, which increases the nasal volume by 64%. Based on the pressures applied, we estimate that the elephants can inhale at speeds of over 150 m s−1, nearly 30 times the speed of a human sneeze at 4.5 m s−1. These high air speeds enable the elephant to vacuum up piles of rutabaga cubes as well as fragile tortilla chips. We hope these findings inspires further work in suction-based manipulation in both animals and robots.
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Schulz, Andrew K.; Ning Wu, Jia; Sara Ha, Sung Yeon; Kim, Greena; Braccini Slade, Stephanie; Rivera, Sam; et al. (2021). Supplementary material from "Suction feeding by elephants". The Royal Society. Collection. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.5432421.v1
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AUTHORS (8)
AS
Andrew K. Schulz
JN
Jia Ning Wu
SS
Sung Yeon Sara Ha
GK
Greena Kim
SB
Stephanie Braccini Slade
SR
Sam Rivera
JR
Joy S. Reidenberg
DH
David L. Hu