Puffin dipping dynamics

• Main Author: Precosky, A.
• Format: Report
• Language: English
• Published: National Research Council of Canada. Institute for Marine Dynamics 2002
• Subjects: puffin; dipping; Atlantic puffin; fratercula; Fratercula arctica
• Online Access: https://nrc-publications.canada.ca/eng/view/object/?id=09a1cd4f-9483-44fe-8c7a-f1ce4bc2602c; https://nrc-publications.canada.ca/fra/voir/objet/?id=09a1cd4f-9483-44fe-8c7a-f1ce4bc2602c

Provided with a three-dimensional scan of an Atlantic Puffin (Fratercula arctica) and position data as a function of time for several key points on the puffin's body throughout a dive into sea water, a moving surface mesh was needed to be used in a boundary element method analysis. A method was developed to generate the surface mesh for each time step in the dive. Changes to existing boundary element method code were made as well, to allow it to work with the puffin geometry. The mesh was generated by interpreting the 3D scan as a series of 2D profiles, and finding a finite number of points on each profile. The points were then joined together to form quadrilateral panels. The wing motion of the puffin was recreated by rotating the 2D wing profiles about axes that correspond to the bird's natural joints. The motion was interpolated using a cubic spline to generate smooth dive sequences. The results of the CFD analysis were not yet available during the writing of this report. NRC publication: Yes