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Ornithopterus
  • Home
  • Creative Team
  • Publications
  • Outreach
  • Research
  • On-air
  • Contact

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Victor M. Ortega

The Ornithopterus Lab focuses on organismal dynamics, from flamingos and insects to helicopter seeds and nematodes. We investigate how they move through challenging environments such as rain, turbulence, or dust devils, as well as the trade-offs produced by capillary and electrostatic forces on animal interactions.


Comic on Flamingos

I want to thank Sofia Caetano and JoAnna Wendel from Snexplores.org, for their fantastic comic inspired by our flamingo research. …read more

December 12, 2025December 16, 2025

Bioinspiration in the NYT

A New York Times article that was published yesterday highlights how evolution fuels bio-inspired designs and includes our Ripple bugs research! …read more

December 10, 2025December 12, 2025

Fatal Electrical Attraction

Scientific American, Science, and The NYT featured our research on how nematodes use static electricity to reach their charged host…read more

October 23, 2025December 10, 2025

Featured Video in Science

We’d like to thank Annie Roth and Chris Schodt for a recent video highlighting the Ornithopterus Lab and our recent research in Science Magazine…read more

October 17, 2025October 17, 2025

Ripple bugs in Science

Our new research on fanned water striders, is now published in Science and featured on the cover.…read more

August 21, 2025December 16, 2025

SICB News

We thank Brady Nichols for highligthing our SICB 2025 talk on leg-mediated aerial control in water striders …read more

June 4, 2025December 10, 2025

Flamingos Uncovered

The New York times, BBC Wildlife, SN, and the Short Wave Podcast featured our research on how filter-feeding flamingos produce vortex traps…read more

May 12, 2025October 17, 2025

Animal Dynamics

Take a look at this 101 video and an interview by the California Magazine on the wonders of animal dynamics. …read more

December 13, 2024June 1, 2025

Quanta Magazine

We are happy to share that Quanta Magazine highlighted our research on electrostatics effects on animal interactions.…read more

September 30, 2024December 10, 2025

Back Home

I am excited to announce that I am joining UC Berkeley. Go Golden Bears!…read more

August 16, 2024December 10, 2025

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