BioInspired! So What? Now What!

In the course of the development of animal species, flying has been “invented” several times.  The first winged insects began to populate the forest of the Carboniferous period about 350 million years ago - the wing surfaces of these insects were smooth.  Butterflies with scaled wings began to fly into the sky of the Jurassic period.  Through natural selection, the butterflies have been experimenting with scale coverage and scale microstructure for 210 million years.  Among all present day insects, butterflies and moths with scale coverage are the record holders of two titles: long distance travel (butterfly Danaus plexippus L. (Figure 1) and flight speed (the flight speed of the moth Agrotis ipsilo was 113 km/h) [Sappington et al., 1992].