If you want to see a design that maximizes storage while minimizing materials needed, then look no further than the honeycomb. It is the perfect example of excellent animal engineering, material efficiency, and mathematical beauty. It also is a flexible structure, in the sense that the honeycomb is built by multiple bees that construct its different sections unsupervised. How do they connect these separate sections?
With the help of computer imaging, scientists, led by Auburn University ecologist Michael Smith, investigate how bees fix honeycombs. Through their analysis of over 19,000 individual wax cells in 23 wax comb photographs, the scientists found out that as these separate connections meet at irregular gaps, the bees fill said gaps with “cells of irregular sizes and shapes,” which range from four to nine sides, depending on the needed shape.
The picture shown above shows how much the honeycomb cells within various sections are skewed, and how some cells (the outliers) vary in shape and size.
Smith’s team reported their findings in the scientific journal PNAS.
(Image Credit: Michael Smith; Nils Napp; Kirstin Petersen/ Science Magazine)
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