On my way to work the other morning I heard a story on NPR that actually had me laughing out loud. It wasn't meant to be funny, but something about it just made me chuckle. You can find the article and listen to the story at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128695206.
It was a story about a man who recently completed his Ph.D in...ready? Wait for it....caterpillar locomotion. Wow. I really didn't even know that was possible. Now perhaps at Tufts University caterpillar locomotion falls under a larger program, which is actually what he received his degree in. However, on NPR they simply stated his degree is in caterpillar locomotion. I thought that was pretty funny.
He did a study to experiment how caterpillars move, which included hooking them up to little treadmills. How incredible is that? A caterpillar treadmill? Yes. The picture that came into my mind as I was listening to this was definitely pretty funny.
They went on to discuss that caterpillars actually move by throwing their gut forward. It was a pretty revolutionary discovery - something no one had ever thought of before. This information will be used to make a mechanical caterpillar.
I can't do this article justice, it's best you read it yourself. Also, videos of the caterpillars on the treadmill are available at the above link!
I love NPR and usually the stories are pretty interesting, but this one just really caught me off guard. It was super and gave me a great laugh before work.
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