Marine flatworms (polyclads) employ a wide variety of body kinematics for swimming. In the current study, we employ computational fluid dynamics to study the hydrodynamics and swimming performance of a large variety of swimmers inspired directly from flatworms as well as two other marine invertebrates: Aplysia and Spanish dancers. The free-swimming performance is evaluated via two metrics: Froude efficiency and terminal swimming speed. The study examines the effect of the flapping of the lateral margins of the body as well as body undulation, which are used in various combinations by these animals to achieve swimming. The simulations suggest that a spanwise compact wake with distinct vortex ring structures is well correlated with a high swimming performance. We find that the addition of even a small magnitude of body undulation to lateral flapping results in significant changes in the wake patterns and noticeable improvements in the swimming performance compared to swimmers that...

中文翻译：

---

海洋无脊椎动物游泳的计算模型，对软游泳机器人具有重要意义。

海洋扁虫（多壳虫）利用各种各样的身体运动学来游泳。在当前的研究中，我们使用计算流体动力学来研究直接受扁虫以及其他两种海洋无脊椎动物启发的各种游泳者的水动力和游泳性能，其中两种无脊椎动物是Aplysia和Spain舞者。自由游泳性能通过两个指标进行评估：浮球效率和终点游泳速度。这项研究检查了身体侧面边缘的拍打以及身体起伏的影响，这些动物将它们以各种组合方式用于实现游泳。模拟表明，具有不同涡流环结构的翼展方向紧凑尾流与高游泳性能密切相关。