--- title: How Pigeons Can Help Drones Fly Better description: How pigeons can make drones fly better, the truth about our national debt and more. canonical: https://time.com/4309236/how-pigeons-can-help-drones-fly-better/ author: TIME article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-04-27T16:00:54.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:00:04.284Z article:section: Ideas og:title: How Pigeons Can Help Drones Fly Better og:description: These are today's best ideas. og:url: https://time.com/4309236/how-pigeons-can-help-drones-fly-better/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How Pigeons Can Help Drones Fly Better twitter:description: These are today's best ideas. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # How Pigeons Can Help Drones Fly Better > Sponsored content. 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It explains how TIME's journalism is made, from the first pitch through the editorial decisions behind a finished story or cover. #### How can I read about how TIME chooses its covers? Inside TIME is the newsletter where TIME's Editor-in-Chief explains cover selection and the editorial reasoning behind major stories. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who is the editor of TIME? Sam Jacobs is TIME's Editor-in-Chief. He writes Inside TIME, a twice-weekly newsletter about the newsroom's reporting and editorial decisions. #### Is Inside TIME free? Yes. Inside TIME is a free newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-inside-2026q3/newsletters?i=3c887013-da54-4b39-9beb-aae4a1d6c26c&cr=time-nl-inside-2026q3-v1) by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Apr 27, 2016 4:00 PM UTC by [The Aspen Institute](https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/) ## The Aspen Institute Apr 27, 2016 4:00 PM UTC **1\.** [**Our best drone can’t out-fly a pigeon. Here’s how engineers want to change that.**](https://news.stanford.edu/2016/04/22/stanford-engineers-build-one-kind-wind-tunnel-birds-paves-way-better-drones/) By Bjorn Carey at Stanford University **2\.** [**No, America isn’t going broke.**](http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-04-18/america-is-nowhere-close-to-having-a-debt-crisis) By Noah Smith in Bloomberg View **3\.** [**America is facing a trucker shortage. Meet the immigrants filling the gap.**](http://www.pri.org/stories/2016-04-21/america-s-trucking-industry-faces-shortage-meet-immigrants-helping-fill-gap) By Saul Gonzalez at PRI’s the World **4\.** [**What’s better than having a mentor? Having a network of virtual mentors.**](https://hbr.org/2016/04/the-benefits-of-virtual-mentors) By Bala Iyer and Wendy Murphy in the Harvard Business Review **5\.** [**The vehicle of the future isn’t an electric car.**](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/urb-e-electric-scooter%5Fus%5F5717bfaae4b024dae4f0bdbb) By Damon Beres in Huffington Post  [_The Aspen Institute_](http://www.aspeninstitute.org/) _is an educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4309236/how-pigeons-can-help-drones-fly-better/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4309236/how-pigeons-can-help-drones-fly-better/"},"headline":"How Pigeons Can Help Drones Fly Better","datePublished":"2016-04-27T16:00:54.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:00:04.284Z","description":"These are today's best ideas","url":"https://time.com/4309236/how-pigeons-can-help-drones-fly-better/","keywords":["Innovation","Debt","Drones","mentor","electric car"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"The Aspen Institute","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/the-aspen-institute/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/innovation/","name":"Innovation"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4309236/how-pigeons-can-help-drones-fly-better/","name":"How Pigeons Can Help Drones Fly Better"}}]}] ```