Aerial-aquatic “flapping-wing” robot sheds light on how birds move between air and water
Summary author: Walter Beckwith
American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
A flapping-wing robot that can both swim underwater and fly through the air is helping scientists rethink how diving birds manage life in two radically different worlds. “In addition to shedding light on the morphological and behavioral adaptations of aerial-aquatic animals, the design principles described here lay the foundation for a class of robots that can be used for limnology, oceanography, marine ecosystem monitoring, and coastal management,” the authors write. Roughly 100 bird species are capable of both flying through the air and propelling themselves underwater using only their wings. While these birds use a similar flapping motion in both environments, they adjust by slowing their wingbeats and reducing their wing area underwater. Because water is nearly 1,000 times denser than air, moving efficiently in each medium requires very different forces and wing movements. However, studying these behaviors and movements in live animals is challenging, and computer simulations struggle to model the complex interactions between flapping wings, fluid forces, and the transition from water to air accurately. As a result, the physiological adaptations and compromises that allow birds to move through such disparate environments efficiently remain relatively unknown. According to Raphael Zufferey and colleagues, robotic models offer a valuable alternative because they adhere the same physical principles as living animals while enabling researchers to control their design and movement precisely.
In this study, Zufferey et al. present flapping-wing robots capable of flying through the air, swimming underwater, and transitioning seamlessly between the two environments – aerial-aquatic vehicles designed to explore the physical challenges faced by diving birds and the design strategies that make dual-environment locomotion possible. The modular, 250-gram robot features a streamlined fuselage, two flexible membrane wings, and a movable tail. It is also fully waterproof, untethered, and equipped with onboard electronics, allowing the authors to adjust wing-flapping frequency and tail position wirelessly, to examine systematically how wing size, flexibility, and flapping influence movement in air, underwater, and during transitions between the two environments. By comparing data from diving birds with their experimental observations, Zufferey et al. found that complex wing-folding mechanisms are not essential for aerial-aquatic locomotion. Instead, an effective balance of wing flexibility, size, and flapping frequency is sufficient to achieve similar performance. What’s more, experiments revealed that smaller wings increase underwater speed but do not improve swimming efficiency, suggesting that reduced wing size in diving birds may primarily enhance maneuverability and prey pursuit rather than conserve energy. Wings with intermediate flexibility provided the best overall performance, improving underwater propulsion while still generating sufficient lift for flight. Because flying requires less energy than swimming, the authors discovered that it was more efficient for the robot to leave the water and fly than to remain submerged over longer distances. The study also showed that wing-powered takeoff from the water is possible without leg assistance, although it requires substantial power.
Journal
Science
Article Title
Leaping out of the water: Aerial-aquatic locomotion with flapping wings
Article Publication Date
9-Jul-2026
New flapping robot swims and flies like a diving bird
MIT engineers’ design could lead to a new class of aerial-aquatic vehicles for ocean exploration
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Loons, gulls, puffins, and petrels are some of the 100 species of birds that can both fly and swim. These diving birds can plunge in water to swim after prey, and leap back into the air to fly away.
Inspired by these naturally aquatic aviators, engineers at MIT and EPFL in Lausanne, Switzerland, have designed a robot that can swim underwater, then flap out of the water to continue flying through air, much like diving birds.
The “flapping-wing aerial-aquatic vehicle,” or FAAV, weighs less than 300 grams (about half a pound) and is designed to help scientists study the mechanics that enable diving birds to fly through air and water.
The robot has a central body, or fuselage; two flexible, flapping wings; and a steerable tail. The wings and tail can be swapped out for different sizes. In experiments carried out in a water tank and at a local lake, the engineers identified combinations of wing size, flapping frequency, and tail angle that enable the robot to smoothly transition from swimming through water to breaking through the surface to flying through the air.
Their results, which will appear in the journal Science, could help scientists understand how diving birds adapt their flight mechanics to move through air and water — mediums with very different physical properties. The design could also launch a new class of aerial-aquatic drones and vehicles. The researchers envision such winged robots could be deployed in oceanography to fly to and sample from aquatic regions that would otherwise be too dangerous for traditional ocean vessels to access.
“Our dream vision is for oceanographers, marine biologists, and members of coastal communities to launch this robot from a boat, or from shore, and it would fly close to the area of interest, such as an iceberg or a port facility, or over a pod of whales,” says Raphael Zufferey, assistant professor of mechanical engineering at MIT. “It would dive into the water to take a measurement or collect a sample, and fly back to deliver the data at a fraction of the cost of traditional methods. Then it could go back out to dive for more.”
Zufferey is the lead author of the new study, which includes co-authors from EPFL and Northwest Indian College in Bellingham, Washington.
Flight mechanics
At MIT, Zufferey heads up the AURA Lab, where he and his students engineer aerial and aquatic vehicles inspired by biomechanics in nature. The robots they build are small in size and designed to unobtrusively explore and monitor the health of oceans and waterways.
For their new work, the team aimed to design a vehicle that can fly in the air and underwater. Any such vehicle would have to adapt to and transition between two very different substances. Water is 1,000 times denser than air, and moving through one or the other requires very different mechanics. Or so people might assume.
“You have to do some adaptation to make that transition work. But there’s a solution that exists in nature,” Zufferey says. “Birds like puffins can fly very fast through the air, and can dive and swim through water at speeds of 3 meters per second. They’re able to do pretty amazing things. So we knew is was possible. Just no one had tried this in a mobile robotic system.”
To get an idea for how diving birds fly, the team looked through the scientific literature and pulled together available data on puffins, petrels, kingfishers, and other diving birds. They observed that smaller birds flap their wings around 10 times per second when flying through air, and around four times per second when swimming through water. Larger birds have a slightly lower flapping frequency through both air and water due to their wider wingspans.
With the biomechanics of birds in mind, the team developed a winged robot designed to flap at similar frequencies to that of actual diving birds.
Making the leap
The new robot roughly resembles a bird, with a body, two wings, and a tail. The body contains a battery and waterproof electric motor that drives a crankshaft, which in turn pumps the wings up and down at preset frequencies. The wings are made of thin membranes that are coated with hydrophobic nanoparticles to help wick away water. And the tail is motorized, enabling it to change its angle to help the robot fly up or dive down.
The wings can be swapped out for different sizes. The researchers fabricated and tested three sets of wings: small (60 centimeters wide), medium (80 centimeters), and large (100 centimeters). They carried out experiments first in a small water tank, then in Lake Geneva in Switzerland.
In their tests, they placed the robot underwater, about half a meter below the surface. They programmed the wings to flap at certain frequencies and the tail to pitch at certain angles throughout the robot’s flight. They then observed under what conditions the robot successfully swam up toward the surface, out of the water and into the air.
The robot flew multiple flights with different wing sizes, flapping frequencies, and tail angles. Overall, the team found the robot was able to reliably fly, swim, and transition between water and air when it flew with medium-sized wings. Flexibility in the wings is key; the wings need to be flexible enough to minimize flapping amplitude in water and also firm enough to keep the robot aloft in the air.
The researchers also found the robot could swim through water at speeds of almost 1 meter per second when it flapped with a frequency of around 5 herz, or five flaps per second. The robot could fly through the air at around 6 meters per second, when flapping at a similar frequency. The speeds and flapping frequencies of the robot were similar to that of actual diving birds.
To make the leap from water to air, they found the robot should be pitched at 70 degrees — a relatively steep angle that keeps the robot’s wingtips from touching the water’s surface as it flaps up and into the air. Any steeper, and the robot would tip back into the water.
Interestingly, this combination of wing size, flap frequency, and tail pitch enabled the robot to swim underwater, launch off the surface, and fly, without something that many diving birds require: feet. When birds such as puffins and ducks take off from the water’s surface, they paddle their feet, along with flapping their wings and pitching their tails. Surprisingly, Zufferey and his colleagues found that, at least in robotics, the act of flying out of water doesn’t necessarily require a paddling maneuver.
“If you look at birds, most birds need to paddle at the surface to take off. And the question was, do we need the same for robots? And it turns out we don’t,” Zufferey says.
Going forward, the team is improving the design of the wings to enable them to turn in addition to flapping up and down. They will also test the robot’s performance under turbulent conditions, such as swimming out of choppy waters and flying through wind. Then, they hope to deploy the vehicle to help answer questions in ocean science.
“One of the major challenges in ocean science is collecting data both frequently and across many locations, which is something this robot could do in the future,” Zufferey says. “You could send this out not just every week, but every hour. It could fly out at high speeds, dive in fly back, deliver its data, and go back out, multiple times.”
This work was supported, in part, by a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions fellowship grant.
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Written by Jennifer Chu, MIT News
Journal
Science
Article Title
Leaping out of the water: Aerial-aquatic locomotion with flapping wings
Article Publication Date
9-Jul-2026
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- New flapping robot swims and flies like a diving bird
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
