Daydreams about the flight of insects

Tags: Insects, Biology, Exoskeletons
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I just watched an insect outside my window hover and then zip away. I started thinking about how hard that would have been for a large bird. I thought about weight/mass differences. And I thought about internal versus external skeletons.

I decided that flying insects must have little or no muscle. But, I can't think of a mechanism which replaces muscle. Are their ligaments, is it all just nerves? Could it be?

Does anyone know how insects move?

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Type: Question • Score: 4 • Views: 129 • Replies: 9

@littlek,

It's muscle.

http://entomology.unl.edu/ent801/muscles.html
http://www.anl.gov/Media_Center/News/2005/news050121.html

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@littlek,

X-ray Movies Reveal Insect Flight, Muscle Motion

FLIGHT MUSCLE PHYSIOLOGY

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@littlek,

I would guess they would have to have ligaments of some kind. SOMETHING has to pull on their either microscopic skeleton, or exoskeleton..

nerves can fire all they want to, but if there is nothing there to take that request from the nerve so to speak, you wont go any where..

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@shewolfnm,

well, everyone answered the question already.
I should read more before replying I guess Wink

I found this, though it gives NO answers, but feeds my sharing of your daydream

http://images.encarta.msn.com/xrefmedia/aencmed/targets/illus/ilt/T014077A.gif

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Drewdad or Robert, can either of you translate those webpages?

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Have you seen Minuscule? (Yes, I know that's not how it's spelled in English.)

It's a series of short films about the secret lives of insects.

Minuscule 1

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@littlek,

About all I took away is that scientists are studying how muscles work in insects.

Daydreams about the flight of insects

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