April 2020, ScientificAmerican.com 15Husbands, a bioinspired roboticist at the Uni-
versity of Sussex, who was not involved in
either study. “An interesting future challenge
might be the development of soft artificial
feathers that can match the real thing in mor-
phing ability.”
Soft, feathered wings are “completely
unusual in aerospace engineering”—and build-
ing a working artificial feather remains a major
challenge, says David Lentink, an aerospace
engineer and experimental zoologist at Stan-
ford and principal investigator on both studies.
Structures such as lobate cilia are currently too
small for 3-D printers to handle, he adds.
Still, PigeonBot’s current incarnation could
help zoologists better understand how birds
control their wings during flight, Lentink says.
It is difficult to study live birds in a wind tunnel
and nearly impossible to train them to move just
a wrist or a single finger joint on command. “My
goal is to develop more realistic models of birds
and provide a range of species that fly ver y dif-
ferently,” he adds. Museums have a wealth of
feathers that could be used in robots that mimic
other birds, allowing scientists to study “the
diversity of flight,” Lentink explains. And replac-
ing sentient animals with robots can reduce the
need for animal research. “There’s a very broad
range of things that you can study with these
robots,” he says. “There are numerous scientific
questions that spin out from this.” — Jim Daley
levels on average. Telomerase also rose among
patients whose anxiety levels benefited most
from treatment, although activity averaged
over all participants did not change. There were
even indications that telomerase activity could
predict treatment response. “The people with
the lowest telomerase had greater improve-
ments,” says Verhoeven, who was not involved
in the study. “This needs to be replicated, but
it’s an interesting lead for future research.”
A longer study might show changes to
telomeres themselves; nine weeks was too
short for that, according to Månsson. Neverthe-
less, the re search suggests purely behavioral
changes can affect health at a cellular level.
“Our biology is remarkably dynamic,” Månsson
says. “And it seems to respond quite quickly,
over just weeks, with a behavioral intervention.”
“Psychiatry is very divided between the psy-
chological and biological,” Verhoeven says. “This
paper connects those fields.” These results could
also help relieve the stigma of mental illness,
she adds: “It’s not something that’s only in your
head—it’s also in your body.” — Simon MakinOver 50 New Features & Apps in this New Version!
Over 500,000 registered users worldwide in:
■ 6,000+ Companies including 20+ Fortune Global 500
■ 6,500+ Colleges & Universities
■ 3,000+ Government Agencies & Research Labs25+ years serving the scientific and engineering community.
®For a 60-day FREE TRIAL, go to OriginLab.Com/demo and enter code: 9246
Untitled-453 1 20/09/2019 15:© 2020 Scientific American