Comparative Biologists and Aerospace Engineers: Important Allies to Explore the Secrets of Natural Flight

To uncover the principles behind the multifaceted topic of animal flight, we must incorporate perspectives on physics, physiology, ecology, and evolution, themes explored in the "Dinosaurs to Drones: Comparative Approaches to Understanding Flight" symposium. Yet these fields often remain siloed by differences in terminology and approaches. By contrasting evolution and engineering optimization, we highlight how differences between seemingly similar concepts can lead to misunderstandings, and how appreciation of those differences can be leveraged to reveal fundamental flight principles such as multifunctional constraints and adaptive versatility. These principles can then be integrated with conventional optimization methodology to both expand the design space for robust aerial systems and deepen insight into how biology achieves adaptable flight. Finally, drawing on the symposium's panel discussion on how to successfully execute interdisciplinary endeavors, we emphasize the importance of supervisory and institutional support for establishing interdisciplinary training, collaboration, and communication opportunities.