Electrostatic clutching offers lightweight, energy-efficient, and fast controllable force transmission for exoskeletons and walking robots. Clutching is achieved by charging two electrically-conductive clutch plates with micrometerscale thickness separated by a thin dielectric insulating layer. Because the clutch acts like a capacitor, power is only required while changing states, not to mainta...

When direct counts are not possible, relative population size indices, based on animal activity (e.g. number of tracks, burrows, feces, calls per unit area), are sometimes the only tools available to investigate population size variations over time. In sea turtles, the number of clutches laid on a nesting beach in a particular season is commonly used as a relative index of population density. T...

life-history models predict an evolutionary trade-off in the allocation of resources to current versus future reproduction. This corresponds, at the physiological level, to a trade-off in the allocation of resources to current reproduction or to the immune system, which will enhance survival and therefore future reproduction. For clutch size, life-history models predict a positive correlation b...

in this paper, a complete model of an electro hydraulic driven dry clutch along with its performance evaluation has elucidated. through precision modeling, a complete nonlinear physical and full order sketch of clutch has drawn. ultimate nonlinearities existent in the system prohibits it from being controlled by conventional linear control algorithms and to compensate the behavior of the system...

Plasticity in life-history characteristics can influence many ecological and evolutionary phenomena, including how invading organisms cope with novel conditions in new locations or how environmental change affects organisms in native locations. Variation in reaction norm attributes is a critical element to understanding plasticity in life history, yet we know relatively little about the ways in...

Clutch size commonly decreases with increasing elevation among temperate-zone and subtropical songbird species. Tropical songbirds typically lay small clutches, thus the ability to evolve even smaller clutch sizes at higher elevations is unclear and untested. We conducted a comparative phylogenetic analysis using data gathered from the literature to test whether clutch size varied with elevatio...

Life-history theory predicts that parents produce the number of offspring that maximizes their fitness. In birds, natural selection on parental decisions regarding clutch size may act during egg laying, incubation or nestling phase. To study the fitness consequences of clutch size during the incubation phase, we manipulated the clutch sizes during this phase only in three breeding seasons and m...

within a population, the sizes of eggs and clutches vary, and the combination of both determines a female’s reproductive investment. we investigated females’ investment in clutches of the Chilean Swallow (Tachycineta meyeni) at the southern limit of its range, where it breeds in an extreme climate. we analyzed variation in clutch, egg and yolk size in relation to the female’s condition, date of...

Elevated nitrite and microcystin concentrations co-occur during degradation of Microcystis blooms and are toxic to aquatic organisms. We studied the relative and combined effects of these on Daphnia obtusa life-history. Nitrite and microcystin-LR treatments were: 0, 1, 3 mg L(-1) and 0, 10, 100, 300 μg L(-1), respectively. Experiments were factorial with 12 treatment combinations. Incubations w...