Wednesday, January 21, 2009

A STICKY LIZARDS


Have you ever wondered how lizards defy gravity every day as they climb up and down the walls and run across the ceiling?.if you have,then you're not alone.Researchers have for years wondered how lizards stick on surfaces,no matter how smooth and the days they have collected has a whole host of information about the spiders,frogs,flies and other sticky wall-crawlers..in fact thisResearchers could "inspire a new generation"of super-sticky materials,with applications from medicine to engineering .
people have been fascinating by lizards and their ability to walk upside down as long ago as during the time of the philosopher Aristotle.Scientist however,came on the scene with their enquires some 150 years ago but they still had trouble cracking this secret.At first they thought that the crawlers like these may have some kind of glue coating on their feet many insects produce a gooey substance that allows them to stick to waxy leaves.But lizards do not leave behind stick tracks,so this theory was rules out.to first significant clue came just a few years ago.And it had to do with a millions of fine hairs or sate on the bottom of the lizard's feet.when a single hair was looked at nuder a special microscope,it was found that it could have hundreds of bristles.scientist also found that the hairs were not sticky by themselves and that it all depends on how the creatures moved"simple pushing the sate onto the surface and dragging them forward a tiny bit made them stick.
so as researches continues with scientist working towards making better versions of lizards tape,with plenty of exciting applications in mind,who knows one day you may also be able to hang out on the ceiling of your home for a short while!.

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