Rivers combine water, while the channels on a wrinkled finger and meant to force water away. The ridges aren’t haphazardly placed that inverted pattern actually makes sense. They found that wrinkled fingers had the exact inverse formation as river drainages, with a raised, interconnected “tree” of bumpy skin, punctuated by diverging, disconnected sunken channels. To see if wrinkled primate fingers had similar features to river basins, Changizi and his team analysed photos of 28 human fingers. The pieces of land between the streams and brooks, on the other hand, are disconnected. In a typical ‘watershed’, multiple streams combine into larger channels, which eventually dump into a central river, much like twigs combine to form branches, which flow into a tree’s trunk.
REFLEX ARENA THIN EFFECTS MANUAL
In other words, the wrinkles that result from exposure to water can be thought of as tiny, manual river drainage systems. In 2011, Changizi and his colleagues found evidence that wrinkled fingers indeed act as rain treads, channelling water away from the fingers and toes during wet conditions, allowing primates – humans and macaques, to be specific – to maintain tighter grips.
But researchers can look for hints, tell-tale clues that indicate that a feature may indeed have evolved as an adaptation. It’s extremely difficult to prove that any biological feature is an adaptation, let alone why it may have evolved. Wrinkled fingers, then, could be optimally designed for gripping in both wet and dry conditions.
0 kommentar(er)
