penguin huddling dynamics

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Last Updated on Wednesday, 04 April 2012 09:52

The survival techniques of Emperor penguins have long intrigued scientists. One unresolved question was how penguins move to the inside of a huddle when the animals stand packed so tightly that no movement seems possible. Daniel P. Zitterbart and his team discovered that penguins solve this problem by moving together in coordinated periodic waves. This was observed by tracking the positions of hundreds of penguins in a colony for several hours. The periodic waves are invisible to the naked eye as they occur only every 30-60 seconds and travel with a speed of 12 cm/s through the huddle. Although small, over time they lead to large movements that are reminiscent of dough during kneading. The authors compare the formation of a huddle to “colloidal jamming” and the periodic waves to a “temporary fluidization”.  “Our data show that the dynamics of penguin huddling is governed by intermittency and approach to kinetic arrest in striking analogy with inert non-equilibrium systems, including soft glasses and colloids.” 

Daniel P. Zitterbart is currently developing a remote-controlled observatory to study penguins all year round.  He hopes to witness the reversal of the dramatic decline in penguin colony sizes that is occurring in all areas of the Antarctic.

supporting information:

Formation of a penguin huddle and occurrence of coordinated traveling waves. Time lapse recordings (full field of view) over 2 h (resolution reduced from 10MP to 480p), showing about half of the penguin colony during the aggregation and huddling process. At the beginning of the movie (~ 12 p.m. with temperatures above -35 °C), only few penguins aggregated in smaller huddles. As the temperatures gradually fell, larger and more stable huddles formed until nearly all the penguins aggregated in one large huddle.

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In the News:
ABCScience
NY Times
BBC News
Spiegel
Nature NewsBlogs
Scientfic American
National Geographic
National Wildlife Magazine
Physik-Journal Oktober 2011: Interview mit Daniel Paranhos Zitterbart
Toronto Star 
Wired Science 
Bayerischer Rundfunk   
Wired UK
ORF
Audubon
Cosmic Log
Welt der Physik
Greenpeace Magazin
Süddeutsche Zeitung
Nürnberger Zeitung
Mittelbayerische Zeitung

Our penguin project is now featured at the German Museum of Technology in Berlin in a special exhibition on wind and energy.

Contact Information:
Daniel P. Zitterbart
Department of Physics
University of Erlangen-Nuremberg
Henkestrasse 91
91052 Erlangen
Germany

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