What is it about?
Water striders escape from underwater predators by jumping without breaking the water surface. However, the research shows that the giant water striders, Gigantometra gigas, break the surface in order to reach speed needed to escape from predators.
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Why is it important?
The researchers discovered that water striders heavier than about 80 mg should use the jumping mechanism based on breaking the water surface to reach the speed that can protect them from fish’s attack. This illustrates the important role of natural selection in the evolution of new jumping mechanism in large water striders. This finding demonstrates that closely related species can utilize different physical mechanisms depending on their size, despite performing the same behavior (jumping) for the same function (escaping from predators).
Perspectives
The study provides inspiration for water walking robots and establishes solid theoretical grounds for future comparative analyses across multiple species of water striders to understand coevolution between body size and jumping mechanism in water striders
PIOTR JABLONSKI
Museum and Institute of Zoology, Polish Academy of Sciences,
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Two different jumping mechanisms of water striders are determined by body size, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, July 2023, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2219972120.
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