What are the mechanics behind bird flight?

Question

Sombody help me win a bet. I am curious about the mechanics of bird flight. I also have a second part to this question....could mankind replicate bird flight through the use of prosthetics or another type of apparatis for single person flight?

Answer 1

The mechanics behind bird flight involve lift. The wing causes a high pressure underneath the wing and a low pressure above. To achieve equilibrium the bird is forced upwards

As far as the second portion of your question, that is called biomimetic design (mimicking biology) and it is a field of mechanical and aerospace design. So yeah, eventually they could however a bird's weight compared to it's lift force is much different than that which would be produced on a human. Basically, birds are meant to fly and people are not.

Other applications of biomimetic design include other animals such as wasp flight, octopus propulsion, etc.

Answer 2

Bernoulli's principle