Academic literature on the topic 'Climbing salamanders'

Lungless salamanders (Plethodontidae) are often active on the surface on rainy evenings, and some species may even climb vegetation in search of prey. Here I report the first investigation of plant climbing in the Northern Two-lined Salamander (Eurycea bislineata). Surveys were carried out along Bat Lake Creek in Algonquin Provincial Park over four rainy nights in summer 2007 for Northern Two-lined Salamanders. I compared the numbers of Northern Two-lined Salamanders foraging on the ground with those climbing on plants, and over half of the Northern Two-lined Salamanders were climbing plants. This behaviour may provide the Northern Two-lined Salamander with access to an underutilized food source, and plants may represent an additional foraging habitat for this species.

Terrestrial salamanders of the family Plethodontidae are common predators of invertebrates in deciduous forest communities of eastern North America. While normally residing and foraging in forest-floor microhabitats, many species facultatively climb vegetation. Different hypotheses have been proffered to explain this behaviour including optimal-foraging strategies and predator avoidance. Using laboratory-based trials, we tested the hypothesis that the terrestrial salamander Plethodon cinereus climbs in response to scent trails left by insect prey. We found that salamanders climbed significantly higher and spent significantly more time climbing on wooden dowel rods that had been treated with prey residue than they did on control rods. Scent trailing possibly interacts with other factors such as optimal-foraging opportunities and predation risk in influencing climbing behaviour in these salamanders.

ABSTRACTPlethodontid salamanders inhabit terrestrial, scansorial, arboreal and troglodytic habitats in which clinging and climbing allow them to access additional food and shelter as well as escape from unfavorable temperature and moisture conditions and ground-dwelling predators. Although salamanders lack claws and toe pads found in other taxa, they successfully cling to and climb on inclined, vertical and inverted substrates in nature. Maximum cling angle was tested on smooth acrylic, and the relationship between cling angle, body mass and surface area of attachment (contact area) was investigated. This study found that many salamander species can cling fully inverted using only a portion of their ventral surface area to attach. Salamanders fall into three functional groups based on mass and maximum cling angle: (1) high-performing, very small salamanders, (2) moderately high performing small and medium-sized salamanders and (3) low-performing large salamanders. They show significant differences in maximum cling angle, even between species of similar mass. In species of similar mass experiencing significantly different detachment stress (resulting from significantly different contact area), differences in morphology or behavior affect how much body surface is attached to the substrate. High performance in some species, such as Desmognathus quadramaculatus, is attributable to large contact area; low performance in a similarly sized species, Ensatina eschscholtzii, is due to behavior that negatively impacts contact area. There was no clear evidence of scaling of adhesive strength with increasing body size. Salamander maximum cling angle is the result of morphology and behavior impacting the detachment stresses experienced during clinging.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to propose a two-degrees-of-freedom wire-driven 4SPS/U rigid‒flexible parallel trunk joint mechanism based on spring, in order to improve the robot’s athletic ability, load capacity and rigidity, and to ensure the coordination of multi-modal motion. Design/methodology/approach First, based on the rotation transformation matrix and closed-loop constraint equation of the parallel trunk joint mechanism, the mathematical model of its inverse position solution is constructed. Then, the Jacobian matrix of velocity and acceleration is derived by time derivative method. On this basis, the stiffness matrix of the parallel trunk joint mechanism is derived on the basis of the principle of virtual work and combined with the deformation effect of the rope driving pair and the spring elastic restraint pair. Then, the eigenvalue distribution of the stiffness matrix and the global stiffness performance index are used as the stiffness evaluation index of the mechanism. In addition, the performance index of athletic dexterity is analyzed. Finally, the distribution map of kinematic dexterity and stiffness is drawn in the workspace by numerical simulation, and the influence of the introduced spring on the stiffness distribution of the parallel trunk joint mechanism is compared and analyzed. It is concluded that the stiffness in the specific direction of the parallel trunk joint mechanism can be improved, and the stiffness distribution can be improved by adjusting the spring elastic structure parameters of the rope-driven branch chain. Findings Studies have shown that the wire-driven 4SPS/U rigid‒flexible parallel trunk joint mechanism based on spring has a great kinematic dexterity, load-carrying capacity and stiffness performance. Research limitations/implications The soft-mixed structure is not mature, and there are few new materials for the soft-mixed mixture; the rope and the rigid structure are driven together with a large amount of friction and hindrance factors, etc. Practical implications It ensures that the multi-motion mode hexapod mobile robot can meet the requirement of sufficient different stiffness for different motion postures through the parallel trunk joint mechanism, and it ensures that the multi-motion mode hexapod mobile robot in multi-motion mode can meet the performance requirement of global stiffness change at different pose points of different motion postures through the parallel trunk joint mechanism. Social implications The trunk structure is a very critical mechanism for animals. Animals in the movement to achieve smooth climbing, overturning and other different postures, such as centipede, starfish, giant salamander and other multi-legged animals, not only rely on the unique leg mechanism, but also must have a unique trunk joint mechanism. Based on the cooperation of these two mechanisms, the animal can achieve a stable, flexible and flexible variety of motion characteristics. Therefore, the trunk joint mechanism has an important significance for the coordinated movement of the whole body of the multi-sport mode mobile robot (Huang Hu-lin, 2016). Originality/value In this paper, based on the idea of combining rigid parallel mechanism with wire-driven mechanism, a trunk mechanism is designed, which is composed of four spring-based wire-driven 4SPS/U rigid‒flexible parallel trunk joint mechanism in series. Its spring-based wire-driven 4SPS/U rigid‒flexible parallel trunk joint mechanism can make the multi-motion mode mobile robot have better load capacity, mobility and stiffness performance (Qi-zhi et al., 2018; Cong-hao et al., 2018), thus improving the environmental adaptability and reliability of the multi-motion mode mobile robot.

Thesis (M.S.)--Marshall University, 2002.
Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains vi, 62 p. illustrated with photos and maps. Includes bibliographical references (p. 26-31).

Salamander courtship coordinates the exchange of gametes. Plethodontids have evolved an elaborate means by which this is done. Throughout the family Plethodontidae a tail-straddling walk is performed to orchestrate the transfer of sperm. Typically this behavior is linear, however in the genus Aneides there are exceptions. In the genus Aneides there are two species that have a circular tail-straddling walk; others perform the highly conserved linear tail-straddling walk. I observed courtship in three species of Aneides and used accounts of others to discern which members possessed circular tail-straddling walk and used a phylogeny to map the courtship characters found in the courtships of the members of the tribe plethodontini.
Graduation date: 2003