Two Northwestern University engineers have been studying rat whiskers to learn how mechanical information from the whiskers gets to the rat's brain. The goal is to develop artificial whisker arrays ...

A harbor seal’s whisker is shaped so that it can detect turbulence from its fleeing prey without being influenced by the seal’s own movements. How does this work in underwater sensor technology? Like ...

Inventors, designers and engineers are constantly cribbing from Mother Nature, building new-school robots inspired by old-school biology. Let’s take a look at some of the latest, greatest, and ...

Among the many reasons humans are bizarre among mammals (the dearth of body hair, the bipedalism, the fact that someone invented the turducken) is a sad shortcoming: You and I don’t have sensory ...

Source: Kitty Terwolbeck, via Wikimedia Commons. Whiskers aren’t just decorative. Whisker touch is an active sensory system. Most mammals have whiskers and a few, like rats and shrews, are whisker ...