Seabird trajectories map onto a reduced optimal-control bound for dynamic soaring

TL;DR

This paper develops a simplified optimal-control model to benchmark and compare the flight efficiency of seabirds engaging in dynamic soaring, revealing near-optimal performance in albatrosses and distinct regimes in other species.

Contribution

It introduces a reduced lower bound on transport effort based on a Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman model, enabling cross-species comparison of wind-assisted flight performance.

Findings

Albatrosses operate close to the theoretical efficiency bound.

Cory's shearwaters are above the bound, indicating less optimal energy harvesting.

Oystercatchers exhibit a non-soaring flight regime.

Abstract

Dynamic soaring allows seabirds to harvest mechanical energy from vertical wind shear, but field trajectories lack a benchmark for comparing flight performances across species. We derive a reduced lower bound on transport effort from a simplified Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman optimal-control model in which slow flight incurs an induced-drag penalty, fast flight incurs a dissipative penalty, and wind shear supplies an effective energetic subsidy. After species-specific normalization of transport speed and an accelerometer-based effort proxy, we map wandering albatrosses, Cory's shearwaters, and Eurasian oystercatchers into a common reduced speed-effort plane and estimate their empirical lower frontiers. The albatross frontier lies closest to the reduced bound, consistent with near-optimal wind-energy harvesting. The shearwater frontier is systematically displaced above it, and oystercatchers occupy a distinct non-soaring regime. The resulting framework places specialist dynamic soaring, mixed flap-gliding, and non-soaring flight in a common mechanical representation and provides a reduced benchmark for comparing wind-assisted flight across species using field trajectories.