Live vibes.How do leaf-cutting ants, which carry leaves to their nests, make such clean cuts? A new study shows they use vibrations - just like humans who use vibrating vibrating, v using quivering hand motions made across the client's body for therapeutic purposes. electric knives knives n. Plural of knife. knives Noun the plural of knife knives knife . The ants' mouthparts vibrate when they emit TO EMIT. To put out; to send forth, 2. The tenth section of the first article of the constitution, contains various prohibitions, among which is the following: No state shall emit bills of credit. high-frequency chirps. (Sounds, after all, are vibrations.) As the ants bite down on a leaf, their vibrating jaws slice through Verb 1. slice through - move through a body or an object with a slicing motion; "His hand sliced through the air" slice into go, locomote, move, travel - change location; move, travel, or proceed, also metaphorically; "How fast does your new car go?"; "We . The vibrations probably help keep the leaves taut taut adj. taut·er, taut·est 1. Pulled or drawn tight; not slack. See Synonyms at tight. 2. Strained; tense: nerves taut with anxiety. 3. a. , says Mike Whittlesey, of Energy Beam Sciences, a company that makes vibrating knives. If you hold material loosely while cutting, he explains, the downward force of the blades will push the object down. "But vibrating blades move back and forth rapidly over a short distance," Whittlesey adds, so there's less of a tendency for the blade to pull what you're cutting out of shape. Result: "a finer cut." Why would ants need clean-cut leaves? Not to make their nests look neat, say the scientists who discovered the vibrations, but rather, to make leaf-carrying easier: Smooth-edged leaves are less likely than jagged-edged ones to "catch" on other leaves and fall. |
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