Hawks' flight control can help make fighter jets highly maneuverable

Researchers from the University of Oxford and the University of California, Davis studied the flight mechanics of Harris’s hawks to inform the design of highly maneuverable flying machines such as jets and drones. Using motion capture imaging and wind tunnel experiments with 3D-printed hawk wing models, they observed how the hawk changes its wing and tail configurations when flying through narrow gaps. The hawk shifts from a spread-wing, aerodynamically unstable state—allowing high maneuverability—to a tucked-wing, stable state that enables steady flight. This dynamic transition between stability states is uncommon in traditional aircraft design. The study, published in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface, highlights that the nonlinear relationship between pitching moment and lift in the hawk’s wing configurations provides flight performance flexibility. Unlike human-built aircraft that typically maintain either stable or unstable configurations, Harris’s hawks rapidly switch between these states to navigate complex environments, such as hunting in teams around obstacles. These insights could inspire novel bio-inspired fixed-wing