--- title: How Bats Could Influence the Future of Air Travel: New Research description: A new study demonstrates that bats fly using highly sensitive touch sensors on their wings that respond to changes in airflow. canonical: https://time.com/3841849/bats-flight-air-travel/ author: Tessa Berenson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-04-30T16:20:47.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T06:49:37.947Z article:section: Science og:title: How Bats Could Influence the Future of Air Travel og:description: This is what researchers learned from the way bats fly og:url: https://time.com/3841849/bats-flight-air-travel/ 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 Bats Could Influence the Future of Air Travel twitter:description: This is what researchers learned from the way bats fly twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # How Bats Could Influence the Future of Air Travel  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Apr 30, 2015 4:20 PM UTC  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Apr 30, 2015 4:20 PM UTC A new study reveals how bats are able to fly with such precision in the dark, a finding that could eventually lead to innovations in airplane technology, researchers said. The study, which examined big brown bats in North America and was published April 30 in _Cell Reports_, demonstrates for the first time that bats fly using highly sensitive touch sensors on their wings that respond to changes in airflow. These receptors then send signals to neurons in the bats’ brains, allowing the animal to make quick adjustments in flight. The researchers from Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University and the University of Maryland say their findings could help people design aircraft that can sense and adjust to air turbulence and better avoid obstacles. “This kind of information could be very important in the design of aircraft, particularly aircraft that must maneuver through complex environments,” said Cynthia Moss, one of the senior authors of the study and a professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Johns Hopkins. “Biology has done an exquisite job creating these animals that can maneuver so agilely, and so we might be able to learn some basic principles from the bat that could be transferred into technology.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3841849/bats-flight-air-travel/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3841849/bats-flight-air-travel/"},"headline":"How Bats Could Influence the Future of Air Travel","datePublished":"2015-04-30T16:20:47.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T06:49:37.947Z","description":"Researchers are learning from the way bats fly","url":"https://time.com/3841849/bats-flight-air-travel/","keywords":["animals","Air travel","flight","Planes"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tessa Berenson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/"}],"articleSection":"Science","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/science/","name":"Science"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/animals/","name":"animals"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3841849/bats-flight-air-travel/","name":"How Bats Could Influence the Future of Air Travel"}}]}] ```