COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH: HYDRODYNAMIC MECHANISMS AND SCALABILITY OF METACHRONAL SWIMMING ACROSS VISCOUS TO I…

Assistance award details

Assistance award identifier

ASST_NON_2516632_049

FAIN

2516632

Recipient

OKLAHOMA STATE UNIVERSITY

Awarding agency

National Science Foundation

Funding agency

National Science Foundation

Assistance listing (CFDA)

47.041

Total obligated

$348,176

Period

Feb 15, 2026 – Jan 31, 2029

Fiscal year

2026

Place of performance state

OK

Source file

FY2026_All_Assistance_Full_20261006.zip

Description

COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH: HYDRODYNAMIC MECHANISMS AND SCALABILITY OF METACHRONAL SWIMMING ACROSS VISCOUS TO INERTIAL FLOW REGIMES -MANY AQUATIC ORGANISMS USE A TECHNIQUE CALLED METACHRONAL ROWING TO SWIM. THEY USE THEIR PADDLE-LIKE APPENDAGES TO ROW IN A COORDINATED RHYTHM, STARTING FROM THE REAR AND MOVING TOWARD THE FRONT OF THE ORGANISM. METACHRONAL ROWING IS OBSERVED IN ORGANISMS THAT RANGE IN SIZE FROM SINGLE CELLS TO LARGE CRUSTACEANS SUCH AS SHRIMP AND KRILL. THIS PROJECT WILL USE EXPERIMENTS AND COMPUTATIONAL MODELING ON LIVE ANIMALS AND METACHRONAL ROWING VEHICLES TO EXPLAIN WHY THIS SWIMMING TECHNIQUE WORKS REGARDLESS OF ORGANISM SIZE. BY EXAMINING HOW ANIMALS OF DIFFERENT SIZES OPTIMIZE THEIR SWIMMING APPENDAGES, THIS RESEARCH WILL HELP DESIGN UNDERWATER VEHICLES THAT CAN EFFICIENTLY OPERATE OVER BROAD RANGES OF SIZES AND SPEEDS. UNDERGRADUATE AND GRADUATE STUDENTS WILL RECEIVE CROSS-DISCIPLINARY TRAINING IN FLUID MECHANICS, ROBOTICS, AND SCIENTIFIC COMPUTING. NEW SUMMER CAMPS ON BIO-INSPIRED ENGINEERING WILL BE DEVELOPED FOR HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS. THIS PROJECT WILL ELUCIDATE THE FLUID DYNAMIC PRINCIPLES THAT ENABLE THRUST AND LIFT GENERATION BY METACHRONAL ROWING ACROSS AN ASTOUNDING SEVEN ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE IN PADDLE-SCALE REYNOLDS NUMBER FROM STRONGLY VISCOUS (0.01) TO INERTIALLY DOMINATED (10,000) FLOW REGIMES. PREVIOUS STUDIES OF METACHRONAL ROWING HAVE CONSIDERED TETHERED PADDLING WITHOUT BODY MOTION FOR A LIMITED REYNOLDS NUMBER RANGE. FLOW VISUALIZATION AND FORCE MEASUREMENTS WILL BE PERFORMED ON STATE-OF-THE-ART DYNAMICALLY SIMILAR REMOTELY OPERATED VEHICLES TO EXAMINE THE FLOW PHYSICS, SWIMMING PERFORMANCE AND SCALABILITY OF METACHRONAL ROWING ACROSS THE BIOLOGICALLY RELEVANT RANGE OF REYNOLDS NUMBERS. COMPUTATIONAL SIMULATIONS WILL BE CONDUCTED TO EXAMINE FLUID-STRUCTURE INTERACTION IN UNTETHERED METACHRONAL SWIMMING AND EVALUATE THE COST OF TRANSPORT FOR VARYING REYNOLDS NUMBER, PADDLE GEOMETRY AND KINEMATICS. THE INTEGRATED EXPERIMENTAL AND COM