Does the biological wheel exist?

[Christophe]

Very fair but again: it's a sphere and not a wheel

There is a slight shade.

I know I chipot

[Obamot]

wow, you're chipboarding, that's for sure! And even, you chi-chipo-potts

A wheel can have the shape of a sphere.

Here at the Michelin Challenge Design Award 2008, this Audi concept car:



With a single sphere-shaped wheel:



The important thing is not only the form, but the function! And pi also a wheel is totally included in a sphere (here, for laughter: a concept car from what is left ... of a WV bus) ....

[dreamer]

Someone has already mentioned the dung beetle that rolls a dung ball but we can also put the amaranth in the pile (these spherical bushes that we see in the westerns just before two cowboys shoot at each other) that uses its round shape so that the wind rolls it and carries it off with its seeds.

"in English we say tumbleweed": p
(cfr an episode of 2 minutes of the people of perusse)

Otherwise there is the blue hedgehog:


But except for the dung beetle that has been quoted (and does not fit) I do not see either ...

[Obamot]

If tires are admitted and there is no reason not to do it! The hedgehog seems to me an excellent answer.

One evening on my way home, I personally shot in a hedgehog unintentionally on a sloping road, I can guarantee that he was able to ride a long enough length, thanks to the inertia deployed by another ... "mammal"!

Here's why: when he gets into a ball, he can literally lock himself inside, protected by his picks. And as the video shows, simply pressing down on them would cause a sort of conditioned reflex.

Too cute as an animal ... and not so shy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBeFZwGpq9k

[dedeleco]

And all too often, many of them so cute crushed by our cars on the roads !!

[Ahmed]

To think that the wheel is a means in-itself effective to move is an error of perception that reveals the late use of the mechanical wheel.
I do not doubt that many have thought of it in ancient civilizations, but the wheel presupposes the road or at least a path sufficiently plan and firm: it is a very demanding condition and the traditional method is, in the absence of such infrastructures , more adapted.

[Janic]

To think that the wheel is an effective in-itself means of moving is a perception error revealed by the late use of the mechanical wheel.
I do not doubt that many have thought of it in ancient civilizations, but the wheel presupposes the road or at least a path sufficiently plan and firm: it is a very demanding condition and the traditional method is, in the absence of such infrastructures , more adapted.

this is why the most common forms of displacement are hinge systems (leg, leg)

[sen-no-sen]

To think that the wheel is a means in-itself effective to move is an error of perception that reveals the late use of the mechanical wheel.
I do not doubt that many have thought of it in ancient civilizations, but the wheel presupposes the road or at least a path sufficiently plan and firm: it is a very demanding condition and the traditional method is, in the absence of such infrastructures , more adapted.

Absolutely, it appears from studies in robotics that the best way to move is walking, which requires legs.

[FPLM]

The wheel is not energy efficient because it is necessary to move the entire circumference while only the wheel-ground contact point participates in the movement. Nature is much more perfectionist. In addition, an articulated leg can describe a circular trajectory (lizard) like many others more complex.

[Ahmed]

I do not agree with your analysis, FPLM (hard to pronounce your nickname!): the wheel, by providing a point of contact successive and continuous with the ground, minimizes the complex movements and the inertia related to the reciprocating movements of the march.
On the other hand, it removes the energy absorbed by the lift to be limited to that devoted to propulsion.

The weak point, I said, is that the wheel forms a mechanical couple with its support, the road or the road and that it is only when there is a match between the two that the whole is effective.