Swimming Through Sand (7 of 7) (IMAGE)

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

Swimming Through Sand (7 of 7)

Caption

The 10 cm long sandfish lizard rapidly dives into and swims through granular media like desert sand. Granular media display solid and fluid-like behaviors, and high speed X-ray imaging reveals that the sandfish swims within the material at speeds up to 15 cm/sec by undulating its body without the use of its limbs. This image relates to an article that appeared in the July 17, 2009, issue of Science, published by AAAS. The study, by Dr. R. D. Maladen of Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, and colleagues, was titled, "Undulatory Swimming in Sand: Subsurface Locomotion of the Sandfish Lizard."

Credit

Photo by Ryan Maladen and Lionel London

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