Flapping Baby Birds Give Clues On Flight's First Origin

Flapping baby birds may have given scientists some clues about how the earliest ones took flight.

Researchers at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and the University of California, Berkeley, have found that evidence dated back to 150 million years ago likely reveals how many young birds learn soar. 

"From day one, post-hatching, 25 percent of these birds can basically roll in midair and land on their feet when you drop them," said lead study author Robert Dudley of the university, who also is affiliated with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Balboa, Panama, in a news release. "This suggests that even rudimentary wings can serve a very useful aerodynamic purpose."

Researchers have found that just nine days after hatching, 100 percent of the birds in the study had developed coordination and symmetric flapping. Researchers also found that aerial righting via uncoordinated, asymmetric wing flapping was present at very early development, which likely evolved, according to Dudley, because "nobody wants to be upside down, and it's particularly dangerous if you're falling in midair. But once animals without wings have this innate aerial righting behavior, when wings came along it became easier, quicker and more efficient."

Researchers also hypothesized that true powered flight may have originated in theropod dinosaurs, which were ancestors to birds. Researchers also believe that symmetric wing flapping seen in many birds today likely evolved in tree-dwelling animals that fell and eventually evolved the ability to glide and fly.

"Symmetric flapping while running is certainly one possible context in which rudimentary wings could have been used, but it kicks in rather late in development relative to asymmetric flapping," Dudley added. "This experiment illustrates that there is a much broader range of aerodynamic capacity available for animals with these tiny, tiny wings than has been previously realized."

More information regarding the findings can be seen via the journal Biology Letters.