Zoology: winging it - magic touch aids bats' flight

The astonishing aerobatic ability of bats depends on specialised touch sensors on their wings, which respond to tiny changes in airflow and provide feedback to the brain as the creatures dive and turn in flight.

Most scientists studying bats had overlooked their special sense of touch and focused, instead, on echolocation, the remarkable sonar system used to detect prey and avoid obstacles. Now a US research team has shown for the first time how touch sensors send information to the brain, where neurons respond by making almost instantaneous adjustments to flight.

The study, published in Cell Reports, "provides evidence that the sense of touch plays a key role in the evolution of powered flight in mammals", says co-author Ellen Lumpkin of Columbia University in New York. "This research also lays the groundwork for understanding what sensory information bats use to perform such remarkable feats when flying through the air and catching insects. Humans cannot currently build aircraft that match the agility of bats, so a better grasp of these processes could inspire new aircraft design and new sensors for monitoring airflow."

The team studied the distribution of sensory receptors, many clustered around hair follicles, in the big brown bat, a common North American species. Different areas of the wing are equipped to send different types of information to the brain. Some sensors detect changes in wind direction as skin between the mid-wing "fingers" stretches and contracts, for example, while others seem designed to sense turbulent airflow.

The nerve connections in bat wings are unlike those in other mammalian forelimbs. They connect not only to the upper spinal cord but also to the lower spine, which, in other mammals, would just receive signals from the trunk. The findings illuminate the unusual evolutionary history of bat wings, which incorporate parts of the trunk and even hind limbs as well as forelimbs during embryonic development.

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