CURRENT BIOLOGY, RIBAK ET AL.
Cats aren’t the only animals to land on their feet after a fall. When pea aphids fall—a trick they use to avoid predators—they rotate in mid-air so they can land upright on plants and hold on with their sticky feet, according to a study published in Current Biology this week (February 4).
The aphids don’t have any special structures to right themselves. Rather, the wingless creatures rotate their bodies into the proper orientation by adopting just the right posture—with antennae forward and back legs angled up and back—such that they are only aerodynamically stable when upright. In this position, the air naturally flips them over.
When dropped from a height of 20 centimeters (7.9 inches), the aphids landed on their feet 95 percent of the ...
