Scaling in insect wings is a complex phenomenon that seems pivotal in maintaining wing functionality. In this study, the relationship between wing size and the size, location, and shape of wing cells in dragonflies and damselflies (Odonata) is investigated, aiming to address the question of how these factors are interconnected. To this end, WingGram, the recently developed computer‐vision‐based software, is used to extract the geometric features of wing cells of 389 dragonflies and damselfly wings from 197 species and 16 families. It has been found that the cell length of the wings does not depend on the wing size. Despite the wide variation in wing length (8.42 to 56.5 mm) and cell length (0.1 to 8.5 mm), over 80% of the cells had a length ranging from 0.5 to 1.5 mm, which was previously identified as the critical crack length of the membrane of locust wings. An isometric scaling of cells is also observed with maximum size in each wing, which increased as the size increased. Smaller cells tended to be more circular than larger cells. The results have implications for bio‐mimetics, inspiring new materials and designs for artificial wings with potential applications in aerospace engineering and robotics.

中文翻译：

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异速生长揭示了通过临界裂纹长度对蜻蜓类翼细胞结构的进化限制

昆虫翅膀上的鳞片是一种复杂的现象，似乎对于维持翅膀功能至关重要。在这项研究中，研究了蜻蜓和豆娘（Odonata）翅膀大小与翅膀细胞的大小、位置和形状之间的关系，旨在解决这些因素如何相互关联的问题。为此，利用最近开发的基于计算机视觉的软件WingGram提取了16科197种的389只蜻蜓和豆娘翅膀的几何特征。已经发现，翼的单元长度并不取决于翼的尺寸。尽管翼长度（8.42 至 56.5 毫米）和单元长度（0.1 至 8.5 毫米）差异很大，但超过 80% 的单元长度范围为 0.5 至 1.5 毫米，之前被确定为该单元的临界裂纹长度。蝗虫翅膀的膜。还观察到细胞的等距缩放，每个翼中的最大尺寸随着尺寸的增加而增加。较小的细胞比较大的细胞往往更圆。这些结果对仿生学具有重要意义，可以启发人造翅膀的新材料和设计，并在航空航天工程和机器人技术中具有潜在的应用。