Stingrays—Built for Speed

The sleeker the design, the faster the speed—a general rule for trains, planes, and automobiles. So why the bulging eyes and protruding mouth of the sleek-swimming stingray? Hyung Jin Sung and his colleagues at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology in South Korea have an answer: the bulging eyes and mouth create vortices that put pressure toward the back and sides of the stingray while creating low-pressure areas above and in front. What intuitively seems like a design flaw is actually a boost to the stingray’s speed.

Such findings could aid in the design of next-generation watercraft. The more we study God’s brilliant designs, the more inspiration and ideas we discover—even in surprising places.

This article was taken from Answers magazine, January–March, 2022, 29.