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*Give me (you)s and thoughtful replies and don't let my thread 404 edition.
*Is my idea possible? How far away are we from controlling ants? Do you like my picture? How much energy would it take to power my idea(1 million ants)? How does this compare to a car engine? Keep in mind I have no idea what I'm talking about.
First time posting.
https://askabiologist.asu.edu/content/ant-factoids
>According to different estimates, ants can carry 10 - 50 times their body weight!
>How? Because ants are so small, their muscles have a greater cross-sectional area (they are thicker) relative to their body size than in larger animals. This means they can produce more force pound-for-pound
How? Why do thicker muscles lift more? Does that mean that with the same total muscle mass, the thicker muscle lifts more than the thinner muscle?
Also, I had a thought.
Imagine you could control ants.
Imagine that you have a glass sheet that's 1 square meter, and has a negligible weight. Then imagine putting a bunch of ants under the sheet, lets say the sheet fits 1 million ants directly under it's surface, if ants are 5mm long.
Then if each ant weighs 5 milligrams, it would be able to lift 250 milligrams. In total, the ants would be able to lift 250 million milligrams, or about 550 pounds.
Imagine the possibilities! Here I am in pic related. That could be ANTS carrying me(and a few other people)!
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Have you ever wondered why bodybuilders don't compete in Olympic-level weightlifting contests, despite having ton of muscle? That's because they train in a way that results in denser muscle mass that is good for aesthetics but less good for strength.
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>>9095976
what are you saying?
Is it in response to this?
>How? Why do thicker muscles lift more? Does that mean that with the same total muscle mass, the thicker muscle lifts more than the thinner muscle?
mind providing some sources? a little more explanation?
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>>9095924
Nature is not scale invariant OP.
When the size of an animal is multiplied by x, its volume is multiplied by x^3 AND SO IS ITS MASS IN FIRST APPROXIMATION.
This is why these comparisons are irrelevant, the energy a huge animal needs to move is far more tremendous. The resistance of hard structures like bines etc are affected.
For instance elephants cannot jump.
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>>9095924
>How? Why do thicker muscles lift more? Does that mean that with the same total muscle mass, the thicker muscle lifts more than the thinner muscle?
square-cubed law, to put it shortly.
muscle power is related to the cross-sectional area of the muscle. the mass of the muscle is related to it's volume.
here's a thought experiment
assume a muscle is a cube. its mass is density [math] \rho [/math] and its side length is [math] r [/math].
as i said above, its power would be proportional to cross-sectional area or [math] r^2 [/math]
and thus its power per unit mass would be [math] \frac{r^2}{\rho r^3} [/math] or [math] \frac{1}{\rho r} [/math]
so it's easy to see that the power per unit mass would be very large, if [math] r [/math] or [math] \rho [/math] were very small
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>>9096045
>bines
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bine_(botany)
Is this what you are referring to?
>This is why these comparisons are irrelevant
>irrelevant
You mean insignificant? What is it not relevant to? Does my idea/thought experiment not work?
How would a 1 square meter ant-powered glass sheet measure up to a combustion engine?
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