Fig 1.
Photographs of vibrissae prepared for testing.
A) a California sea lion vibrissa potted in epoxy mold, B) a harp seal vibrissa potted in epoxy mold, and C) the MTS Insight apparatus testing set up with a Weddell seal vibrissa potted in epoxy mold and held horizontally for cantilever bending. The major axis of each vibrisse is facing the reader and the minor axis is perpendicular to the page.
Table 1.
Material testing vibrissae samples.
Fig 2.
Diagram of vibrissal orientation in water flow and testing orientations.
Fig 3.
Results of materials testing in four orientations.
A subset of pinniped vibrissae was tested in all four orientations. D = Dorsal, A = Anterior, V = Ventral, P = Posterior. Dorsal and ventral did not differ from each other but had significantly lower mean flexural stiffness values than anterior and posterior, which also did not differ from each other. Different letters indicate significant differences between orientations.
Table 2.
Results of EI measurements at two locations on the vibrissae.
Fig 4.
A) 25% of the length and B) 50% of the length. Mean ± s.e.m. values are given for six species of pinnipeds with beaded vibrissae and three species with smooth vibrissae. D = Dorsal orientation and A = Anterior orientation. Species with different letters were significantly different.
Table 3.
Values of Young’s Modulus (E).
Table 4.
Values of I and diameter.