Despite having a trunk that weighs over 100 kg, elephants mainly feed on lightweight vegetation. How do elephants manipulate such small items? In this experimental and theoretical investigation, we filmed elephants at Zoo Atlanta showing that they can use suction to grab food, performing a behaviour that was previously thought to be restricted to fishes. We use a mathematical model to show that an elephant’s nostril size and lung capacity enables them to grab items using comparable pressures as the human lung. Ultrasonographic imaging of the elephant sucking viscous fluids show that the elephant’s nostrils dilate up to $30\text{\%}$ in radius, which increases the nasal volume by $64\text{\%}$. Based on the pressures applied, we estimate that the elephants can inhale at speeds of over 150 m s⁻¹, nearly 30 times the speed of a human sneeze. These high air speeds enable the elephant to vacuum up piles of rutabaga cubes as well as fragile tortilla chips. We hope these findings inspire further work in suction-based manipulation in both animals and robots.

尽管有一个重达 100 公斤以上的树干，但大象主要以轻质植物为食。大象是如何操纵这么小的物品的？在这项实验和理论调查中，我们在亚特兰大动物园拍摄了大象，展示了它们可以使用吸力来抓取食物，执行以前被认为仅限于鱼类的行为。我们使用数学模型表明，大象的鼻孔大小和肺容量使它们能够使用与人肺相当的压力来抓取物品。大象吮吸粘性液体的超声成像显示，大象的鼻孔扩张至$30\text{\%}$在半径，这增加了鼻腔体积$64\text{\%}$. 根据施加的压力，我们估计大象可以以超过 150 ms ^-1的速度吸气，几乎是人类打喷嚏速度的 30 倍。这些高空气速度使大象能够吸尘成堆的芜菁甘蓝块以及易碎的玉米片。我们希望这些发现能激发在动物和机器人中进行基于吸力的操作的进一步工作。