Study of Experimental Aspects of Dynamic Modeling and Control System Analysis of Hovering Fights of Eristalis Hoverflies

摘要

This is the final report for the project under Contract No. F61775- 02-C4048. The main motivation for the project was to explore suitable theoretical and experimental approaches to characterise flight dynamics and control of insects, originally focusing on the hovering flight of Eristalis hoverflies. The study was soon re-scoped to investigate the desert locust Schistocerca gregaria. Although the locust is an interesting insect in its own right, there were two main motivations for this change of focus. Firstly, it proved prudent from the experimental viewpoint to work with the larger and more robust locust, thus allowing us to perfect the experimental set-up and techniques before proceeding to the smaller hoverflies. Secondly, although forward flight was not originally envisaged as forming part of the study, it quickly became apparent that the greatest difficulties in experimentation were those associated with forward flight, not hover. Simulating forward flight poses such a significant challenge but is so important to reverse engineering insect flight control that we elected to develop from the outset a system capable of simulating natural forward flight. This approach has thus allowed us not only to re-focus, but also to broaden the study.