Birds breathe at an aerodynamical resonance

GABRIEL MINDLIN; FACUNDO FAINSTEIN; SEBASTIAN GELI; ANA AMADOR; FRANZ GOLLER

Lisboa

Conferencia; International Congress Neuroethology 2022; 2022

International Society for Neuroethology

At what rate do birds breathe? Behavior emerges from the interaction of a nervous system, a biomechanical periphery, and the environment. The nervous system, responsible for the generation of the physiological instructions driving the respiratory system, is therefore expected to be constrained by its biomechanical properties. Birds have high metabolic rates and require a continuous supply of oxygen. For that reason, it is not surprising that they developed a highly efficient respiratory system. In this work, we propose a model for the avian respiratory system and discuss how its nonlinearities constrain the emergent behavior. We fit the parameters of the model and show that normal respiration operates at its resonance. For other respiratory regimes, the nonlinearities of the system shift the frequencies at which it operates optimally. More generally, this result is consistent with an emerging picture where several life supporting devices are strikingly fine-tuned to the sources of energy that powers them.