If you happen to be an amateur birder, you may have the habit of chasing kingfisher like me. What draws kingfishers to be watched again and again come from their bright plumage and strikingly fast flight.
As if to further cement my passion of kingfisher, I have learned about its connection with the Shinkansen bullet train during my viewing a virtual conference in Milan today.
Eiji Nakatsu, like so many other of us with a passion for birdwatching, has been the engineer looking after the technical development of the Japanese high-speed bullet trains. He wasn't the first person to be frustrated by the noise and vibration created by their trains. So much so that sonic booms were heard by residents 400 metres away from the train tunnel. And then Eiji got his eureka moment after being inspired by kingfisher's vertical high-speed dive silent enough to score ten in the Olympic diving events. He was curious enough to explore the shape of its bill. In other words, the key is to prevent buildup of pressure wave by reducing the cross-sectional area of the Shinkansen.
Eiji finally figured out to redesign the nose of bullet train like the bill of kingfishers. That's a romantic story of biomimicry to reduce power, fuel, money spent, and yet, create a quieter journey.
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