No, this ostrich is not decked out early for Halloween. The
bird’s glowing get-up is part of an experiment that settled just
why these elongated creatures can run so much faster and farther
than us: They have twice as much bounce in their step. Jonas
Rubenson and colleagues adorned the tame ostriches with the
reflectors at points that would show how their joints moved as
they sprinted down a test track. The team watched the birds run
and then sampled human volunteers the same way. Rubenson’s study
appears in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface. “Cheetahs
and lions are great sprinters, but they use a lot of energy when
moving,” he says. “However ostriches, horses and antelopes are
adapted to running fast and economically over long distances.”
Rubenson says previous work had shown the ostrich uses 50% less
energy running when compared with humans, yet can run at twice
the speed. [Australian Broadcasting Corporation] The question
was how. Did the ostriches save energy by swinging their legs
efficiently, o