Can elephants run?

Learn all information you wanted about elephants for kids by this article: Can elephants run?

Most animals don't think anything of breaking into a run: they switch effortlessly from walking to a high-speed bouncing run. But what about elephants? Their sheer size makes it impossible for them to bounce up in the air at high speeds. So how are high-speed elephants moving: are they running or walking?

At a first glance, fast-moving elephants look as if they are walking, according to John Hutchinson from the Royal Veterinary College, UK. But closer analysis of elephant footfall patterns by Hutchinson suggested that speedy elephants' front legs walk while their hind legs may trot. Norman Heglund from the Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium, realised that the only way to resolve the conundrum was to measure the immense forces exerted on the animals by the ground as they move and found that elephants run in some senses, but not in others.

To measure these forces, Heglund had to construct and calibrate an 8m long, elephant-sized force platform from sixteen 1m2 force plates. Crating the 300kg force plates, cameras and computers in Belgium and shipping the equipment to the Thai Elephant Conservation Centre in Lampang, Thailand, Heglund, Joakim Genin, Patrick Willems, Giovanni Cavagna and Richard Lair built a reinforced concrete foundation and assembled the force platform ready to measure the enormous ground reaction forces generated by the animals.

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Encouraged to move by their mahouts, 34 elephants ranging from an 870kg baby up to a 4 tonne adult moved over the force platform at speeds ranging from a 0.38m/s stroll to a 4.97m/s charge. Based on the force measurements, the Belgian team was able to reconstruct the movement of each animal's centre of mass and found that the elephant's movements are extremely economical. Consuming a minimum of 0.8J/kg/m, an elephant's cost of transport is 1/3 that of humans and 1/30 that of mice.

Heglund explains that the elephant's cost of transport is low because the animal's step frequency is higher than expected and they improve their stability by keeping an average of two feet on the ground even at high speeds, and three at lower speeds. Combining these approaches, the elephant's centre of mass bounces less than other animals', reducing the giant's cost of transport.

Next the team calculated the way that each animal recycles potential energy into kinetic energy to find out whether they run. According to Heglund, running animals continually recycle potential energy stored in tendons and muscles into bouncing kinetic energy -- just like a pogo stick -- while walking animals convert potential energy at the start of a stride into kinetic energy as they step forward -- much like an inverted swinging pendulum. By tracking how elephants cycle potential energy into kinetic energy over the course of a stride, the team could distinguish whether the high-speed animals were running or walking.

Plotting the potential and kinetic energy of the elephants' centres of mass over the course of many strides at different speeds, the team could see that the elephants were walking like an inverted pendulum at low speeds, but as they moved faster, the kinetic and potential energy plots shifted to look like those of runners. However, when the team analysed the movements of the elephant's centre of mass, they could see that it almost maintained a constant level as the animal shifted its weight from one side to the other, but bobbed down and up like a runner's during the second half of the stride.

So the elephants were running by one measure but not by another and it seems that the forelimbs trot while the hind limbs walk at higher speeds. 'High-speed locomotion in an elephant doesn't fall nicely into a classic category like a run or a trot. It really depends on your definition of "run",' says Heglund.

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How Similar Are Human and Animals?

Reading and enjoying the science facts about similarities between human and animals

It is very difficult to find reliable data comparing the human genome to animal genome. The principal reason is that few animals have had their full genome sequenced. Even those that have cannot be easily compared in terms of percentages because the genomic length and chromosomal division can vary greatly from one species to another.

Scouring the Web, here is what I have found so far.

- Genome-wide variation from one human being to another can be up to 0.5% (99.5% similarity)

- Chimpanzees are 96% to 98% similar to humans, depending on how it is calculated.

- Cats have 90% of homologous genes with humans, 82% with dogs, 80% with cows, 79% with chimpanzees, 69% with rats and 67% with mice. 

- Cows (Bos taurus) are 80% genetically similar to humans.

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- 75% of mouse genes have equivalents in humans (source), 90% of the mouse genome could be lined up with a region on the human genome (source) 99% of mouse genes turn out to have analogues in humans 

- The fruit fly (Drosophila) shares about 60% of its DNA with humans.

- About 60% of chicken genes correspond to a similar human gene.

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Facts on Elephants for kids

Enjoy our wide range of elephant facts now:

• An elephant is one of the few four legged animals, which cannot run or jump.
• At birth, the baby elephants are blind and they depend on their trunk and their mothers to help them.
• Females can mate and have babies until they are around 50 years old, and they tend to give birth every 2.5 to 4 years.
• Elephants feed around 16 hours a day and they consume around 300 to 600 pounds of vegetation every day.
• Male elephants go through bouts of aggression, which last for short periods.  Hence, female elephants are kept at the zoos and used in the circus, as they are gentler in nature.
• Elephants are social animals and they are often seen touching and caressing one another and playing around with the trunks.
• An elephants tusk grows up to around 10 feet and weighs around 200 pounds.
• Elephants cool themselves by fanning their ears. This cool down the blood in their ears, which completely cools them off.

• Despite the size of elephant ears the quality of hearing is poor! The body at the back of an elephant ear is surprisingly soft, and called the knuckle, this area is used by trainers to steer and give commands to the elephant. The ears on an African elephant are flapped to help keep the animal cool
• Elephants are herbivores, they eat varying types of vegetation including grass, leaves, fruits, and bark
• Elephants have a walking speed of approximately 4 mph. A surprising fact is that they are able to swim for long distances!
• Elephants walk behind each other in a single line when they are travelling.
• An elephant poops around 80 pounds of feces in a day.
• The elephant rests by raising one foot and crossing it behind the other one.
• Just like dolphins and parrots, the elephant can also do mimicry. Some elephants in Kenya who were raised near the highway were heard to make truck sounds.
• On an average, the elephant sleeps for around 2 hours in a day.
• Elephant’s tusks are of ivory and they are actually the elongated and enlarged incisors.
• Elephants have a very sharp memory and they have the largest brains in the kingdom.
• They are great swimmers and are able to swim for long distances.

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What is the usage of elephant trunk

Have you thought about this mystery: What is the usage of elephant trunk? Let's us give you answer about amzing elephant facts

The elephant is the largest land mammal in the world, and adult male bulls can weigh up to a massive 6,000 kg. Both males and females have tusks, but the males tend to be larger. The tusks grow continually throughout their life, and the longest tusk ever recorded was 355cm. Elephants can live for as long as 60 years.

  The Elephant used to only have a small snout in The Beginning.  This didn't bother him unduly, in fact he was rather proud of his small nose because it never got in the way of feeding and drinking.
Because of his great size, mealtimes were very important to Elephant, and he had to eat and drink a great deal in order to keep his great strength up.
However, he did find it uncomfortable, because he had to go down on bended knees to reach anything.
One day, Elephant was at the river, and was kneeling down drinking from the fresh water.
Crocodile swam past, and saw Elephant at the water's edge.  Crocodile was feeling particularly hungry, and saw an opportunity for a good meal.
Crocodile swam stealthily up to where Elephant was, and suddenly lunged out of the water and grabbed Elephant by the nose.
Elephant was startled, and tried to pull away, but Crocodile had a firm grip on his nose.

However, Elephant was also very strong, and he dug his feet into the bank and fought back.
The 2 battled for hours, and with every pull and tug, Elephant's nose stretched a little more. Eventually, Crocodile became too tired to pull any more, and let go of Elephant.
Elephant ran off, with his now very long nose hanging down in front of his feet.  He was distraught, and hid in the bush as he was too embarrassed to face the other animals.
Soon, Elephant realised that his new stretched nose was more useful than his previously small snout.  He was able to reach food and drink without kneeling any more, and could even reach high branches and pull them down to eat the fruit and leaves.
All the other Elephants soon realised the benefits of having a long trunk, and one by one they too visited the river and taunted the Crocodile to try and pull them into the water.
The Elephants always won the tug-of-wars, and all ended up with lovely stretched snouts, but Crocodile remained hungry.
To this day, all Elephants still have their long trunks rather than a small snout, and Crocodiles have learnt that it is a waste of time and energy attacking Elephants when drinking at the water's edge.
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A list of amazing Bengal tiger facts

It’s hard to say what it is about animals that we love the most – their cute or beautiful looks or their natural innocence. Because there are some dangerous but cute animal that people wnat to know their animal facts. Today, I will introduce you a selected list of Bengal tiger facts:

As of 2010, Bengal tiger populations in India have been estimated at 1,706–1,909. As of 2014, they had reputedly increased to an estimated 2,226 individuals, but the method used in the census may not be accurate.

Bengal tigers number around 440 in Bangladesh and 163–253 in Nepal. Prior censuses placed the population of tigers in Bhutan at around 65-75 individuals, however, the latest census estimated that 103 wild Bengal tigers are living in the country.

Bengal is traditionally fixed as the typical locality for the binomen Panthera tigris, to which the British taxonomist Reginald Innes Pocock subordinated the Bengal tiger in 1929 under the trinomen Panthera tigris tigris.

The Bengal Tiger is one of the largest species of tigers in the world. They are also the one that offers the highest number of them in the wild. Don’t get to excited though as they are still at a high risk of being endangered. There are only about 2,500 of them in the wild.

What is also interesting is that there is about 1% which are DNA verified hybrids. They have one parent that is a Bengal Tiger and one that is a Siberian Tiger. These hybrid tigers seem to do quite well in the wild with most of the males being sterile. It is believed that this genetic link though was the result of mistakes in breeding while in captivity and then released to the wild instead of a natural occurrence that takes place in the wild. You may find many similarities between the Bengal Tiger and the Siberian Tiger.

The biggest threat to the in India is that their natural habitat continues to be cut away by logging companies. As a result they struggle to survive in less area and with less prey to feed upon. Finding enough water is a common problem for them as well. This is because the former is a subspecies off the latter.

This particular species of tiger can weigh up to 500 pounds for a full grown male and about 310 pounds for a full grown female. They also feature very long tails and heads that are larger than that of other species. They are excellent hunters and feed on a variety of prey found around India. They include deer, antelope, hogs and buffalo. They have also been seen consuming monkeys, birds, and other small prey when their main food selections become scarce.

In some areas there has been a problem with the Bengal Tiger eating livestock as well. Humans continue to try to live in these areas that used to be home to the tigers. Then they wonder why the animals they are raising become meals for them. Many of these ranchers engage in the illegal killing of tigers too so that they can protect their investment in such livestock.

There have also been reports of the Bengal Tiger killing and eating humans. However, most tigers avoid humans and this doesn’t happen regularly. They tend to consume up to 60 pounds of food at one time.

It is estimated that less than 2,500 of the Bengal tigers remain at this time. This is less than half of what the population was just 10 years ago. As a result there is a very aggressive protection plan in place for them. The efforts are working to an extent but poaching of these tigers is still a huge concern.

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Some fun science facts for kids

Enjoy our fun science facts for kids. Learn interesting earth facts, amazing chemistry facts, cool space facts, funny facts about animals and much more facts.

1) Collectively Speaking, Humans Have Spent Longer Playing World Of Warcraft (Over 6 Million Years) Than We Have Existed As A Species Separate From Chimpanzees.

2) A Dog Has The Same Ecological Footprint As Two Toyota Landcruisers; A Has Cat The Same Environmental Effect As A Volkswagen Golf; Two Hamsters The Same As A Plasma TV.

3) The Average Person Walks The Equivalent Of Three Times Around The World In A Lifetime.

4) If You Could Drive Your Car Straight Up You Would Arrive In Space In Just Over An Hour.

5) About 65 Billion Neutrinos Will Pass Through Your Fingernail In A Second

6) If All The LEGO Bricks Ever Manufactured Were Clipped On Top Of One Another, They Would Make A Tower Ten Times As High As The Distance To The Moon.

7) Light Would Take .13 Seconds To Travel Around The Earth.

8) If You Drilled A Tunnel Straight Through The Earth And Jumped In, It Would Take You Exactly 42 Minutes And 12 Seconds To Get To The Other Side.

9) A Medium-Sized Cumulus Cloud Weighs About The Same As 80 Elephants.

10) A Single Bolt Of Lightning Contains Enough Energy To Cook 100,000 Pieces Of Toast.

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Human can't fly like birds

Have you ever wondered an interesting science facts question: the reason why birds can fly, but not human and other animals? Let’s see how

Although mankind has conquered the skies with airplanes, we have yet to match up to our winged animal counterparts who fly on their own. And now, scientists have determined that we never will: it is mathematically impossible for humans to fly like birds.

A bird can fly because its wingspan and the wing muscle strength are in balance with its body size. It has a lightweight skeleton with hollow bones, which puts a smaller load on its wings. A bird also has air sacs connected to its lungs, which makes it even lighter and allows for easy passage of air through its lungs during flight.

On the other hand, calculations of the ratio between human size and strength reveal that our species will never be able to take flight unaided. As an organism grows, its weight increases at a faster rate than its strength. Thus, an average adult male human would need a wingspan of at least 6.7 meters to fly. This calculation does not even take into account that these wings themselves would be too heavy to function.

There is a reason that a 6-year-old girl can do more pull-ups than her 40-year-old father — she may be weaker, but her strength-to-size ratio is still greater than her father’s ratio. In other words, humans are not too large to fly, but our strength simply cannot support our weight in flight.

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The Strange Facts of Life

Enjoy the following strange facts of life:

1. If you are right handed, you will tend to chew your food on your right side. Awesome! If you are left handed, you will tend to chew your food on your left side

2. If you stop getting thirsty, you need to drink more water. For when a human body is dehydrated, its thirst mechanism shuts off.

3. Chewing gum while peeling onions will keep you from crying. Interesting!!

4. Your tongue is germ free only if it is pink. If it is white there is a thin film of bacteria on it.

5. The Mercedes-Benz motto is ‘Das Beste oder Nichts’ meaning ‘the best or nothing’. Cool!!

6. The Titanic was the first ship to use the SOS signal. Amazing

7. The pupil of the eye expands as much as 45 percent when a person looks at something pleasing. Interesting!!

8. The average person who stops smoking requires one hour less sleep a night.

9. Laughing lowers levels of stress hormones and strengthens the immune system. Six-year-olds laugh an average of 300 times a day.

Adults only laugh 15 to 100 times a day.

10. Frank Perdue’s chicken slogan, “It takes a strong man to make a tender chicken” was translated into Spanish as “it takes an aroused man to make a chicken affectionate. Awesome!”

11. Dalmatians are born without spots. Interesting!!!!

12. Bats always turn left when exiting a cave. Awesome!

13. The ‘v’ in the name of a court case does not stand for ‘versus’, but for ‘and’ (in civil proceedings. Interesting!!!! or ‘against’ (in criminal proceedings. Interesting!!!!

14. Men’s shirts have the buttons on the right, but women’s shirts have the buttons on the left

15. The owl is the only bird to drop its upper eyelid to wink. All other birds raise their lower eyelids

16. The reason honey is so easy to digest is that it’s already been digested by a bee

17. Roosters cannot crow if they cannot extend their necks

18. The color blue has a calming effect. It causes the brain to release calming hormones

19. Every time you sneeze some of your brain cells die

20. Your left lung is smaller than your right lung to make room for your heart