News tagged with fins
German engineers mimic humpback whale to increase helicopter stability
(PhysOrg.com) -- Whale researchers have known for some time that humpback whales are able to perform feats of underwater acrobatics that belie their huge size and that some of that ability is partly due to ...
Feb 01, 2012 |
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Fish out of water: Gene clue to evolutionary step
Two genes controlling a tissue protein may have played a role in the key period when fish shed their fins and became limbed land-lovers, a study published by Nature on Thursday said.
Jun 24, 2010 |
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Fossils suggest earlier land-water transition of tetrapod
New evidence gleaned from CT scans of fossils locked inside rocks may flip the order in which two kinds of four-limbed animals with backbones were known to have moved from fish to landlubber.
Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils
Apr 17, 2009 |
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Harbor seals' whiskers as good at detecting fish as echolocating dolphins
When a hungry harbour seal sets off in pursuit of a fish diner, the animal has a secret weapon in its tracking arsenal: its whiskers. Detecting hydrodynamic trails in water with their sensitive whiskers, seals ...
Jun 11, 2010 |
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Two new species of fish found able to regenerate a lost fin
(PhysOrg.com) -- History has shown that many invertebrates are able to regenerate lost limbs. Rare however, are animals with backbones that are able to do so, and when they do exist, they are usually amphibians ...
Feb 23, 2012 |
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New species of ghostshark from California and Baja California
New species are not just discovered in exotic locales -- even places as urban as California still yield discoveries of new plants and animals. Academy scientists recently named a new species of chimaera, an ...
Sep 22, 2009 |
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Poisonous Poisson
In contrast to the exhaustive research into venom produced by snakes and spiders, venomous fish have been neglected and remain something of a mystery. Now, a study of 158 catfish species, published in the ...
Dec 04, 2009 |
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Hydrogen peroxide marshals immune system (w/Video)
When you were a kid your mom poured it on your scraped finger to stave off infection. When you got older you might have even used it to bleach your hair. Now there's another possible function for this over-the-counter colorless ...
Medicine & Health / Medical research
Jun 03, 2009 |
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Newly discovered sensory organ in the chin of baleen whales allows them to be world's largest hunters
Lunge feeding in rorqual whales (a group that includes blue, humpback and fin whales) is unique among mammals, but details of how it works have remained elusive. Now, scientists from the Smithsonian Institution ...
May 23, 2012 |
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Lungfish provides insight to life on land
A study into the muscle development of several different fish has given insights into the genetic leap that set the scene for the evolution of hind legs in terrestrial animals. This innovation gave rise to the tetrapods—four-legged ...
Oct 04, 2011 |
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Research links evolution of fins and limbs with that of gills
The genetic toolkit that animals use to build fins and limbs is the same genetic toolkit that controls the development of part of the gill skeleton in sharks, according to research to be published in Proceedings of ...
Mar 23, 2009 |
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Proposed kill quotas for whales too high: scientists
The International Whaling Commission starts a key meeting Monday to debate catch quotas which could replace a moratorium on hunting though a key scientific committee will say the catch limits are too high, ...
Jun 21, 2010 |
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Scientists trace shark fins to their geographic origin for first time using DNA tools
Millions of shark fins are sold at market each year to satisfy the demand for shark fin soup, a Chinese delicacy, but it has been impossible to pinpoint which sharks from which regions are most threatened ...
Dec 01, 2009 |
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Jurassic salamanders with stomach contents found from Inner Mongolia
Paleontologists from Chinese Academy of Sciences reported two Jurassic salamanders with stomach contents from Daohugou, Ningcheng County, Inner Mongolia, China, as reported in Chinese Science Bulletin online ...
Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils
Feb 06, 2012 |
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How fish swim: Imaging device shows contribution of fins
There are fish tales and then there are fish tails. And a report from Harvard researchers in the current issue of the journal Biology Letters seems to demonstrate that previous theories about how bony fish mo ...
Apr 22, 2011 |
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Fin
A fin is a surface used for stability and/or to produce lift and thrust or to steer while traveling in water, air, or other fluid media, (in other words, a foil (fluid mechanics)). The first use of the word was for the limbs of fish, but has been extended to include other animal limbs and man-made devices. Fins, as with other foils, operate in fluids such as water or air.
Fins are seen both in nature and in manmade iterations.
Swimming water animals such as fish and cetaceans actively use pectoral fins for maneuvering, and dorsal fins contribute stability as the animal swims, propelling and maneuvering with its tail, itself recognizable as a fin.
The fin on fixed-wing aircraft is known as a vertical stabilizer. Fins are also seen used as e.g., fletching on arrows and at the rear of some bombs, missiles, rockets, and self-propelled torpedoes. These are typically "planar" (shaped like small wings), although grid fins are sometimes used in specialized cases.
Examples of fins include:
For more information about Fin, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.
