The stylish pleats on a dragonfly’s wings provide more than just a snappy look!

...continued from the first Halloween pennant post.

When I was out in the field photographing the dragonflies, I didn’t know their wings were pleated. I just knew their wings were gorgeous and I wanted a closer look at them, so I started focusing the lens on the wings at different angles, trying to capture the patterns of veining and their thin, delicate beauty. It wasn't until I downloaded the photos and started studying them that I noticed the wings were pleated like corrugated steel or cardboard!

If you look carefully, you can see pleats in the middle of the wing.

Looking straight on, it's easy to see the zig-zaggy ripples.

Intricate, lacy veining...beautiful.

When you're not zoomed in you barely

notice the corrugation, but it's there!

Of course I wanted to know why those wings were zig-zaggy, so I did a quick Google search. The first article that popped up was "A computational study of the aerodynamic performance of a dragonfly wing section in gliding flight," by Abel Vargas, Rajat Mittal and Haibo Dong. That sounded promising, so I read it and found some pretty cool info. If you want to read the entire paper, click here. Published on May 23, 2008, these aerospace engineers from The George Washington University found through a simulated study of pleated and non-pleated wings that the pleats in a dragonfly's wings are a unique adaptation, or in their words, "an ingenious design of nature," that can help produce more lift than a smooth wing. The reason being air circulation between the pleats results in less drag, which is good for gliding (and dragonflies do a lot of that!).

Isn't that cool? What started as an attraction to the lacy, delicate beauty of the veining and iridescence of the wings, turned into another AWE of Mother Nature. She always does know what she’s doing……

I wonder if I can design a super-duper paper airplane with this information! :-)