A bionic aircraft independently developed by a research team at Northwestern Polytechnical University in China refreshed its previous record in flight duration, according to the university's website.
The ornithopter "Xinge," or the homing pigeon, can fly for up to three hours, five minutes and 30 seconds continuously in one charge, breaking the previous Guiness World Record created by the team – which created the other bionic aircraft, Xinge's predecessor Yunxiao flew for 2 hours, 34 minutes and 38 seconds in flight.
With a wingspan of 70 centimeters, the aircraft Xinge weighs 260 grams. Compared to its predecessor Yunxiao, the body of Xinge is smaller with more than half of Yunxiao's wingspan and one quarter of its weight.
"It's a leap in technological advance of the bionic aircraft," according to the university.
Chief scientist Song Bifeng said "the significant increase in fly time not only verifies the performance of the aircraft, but helps expand its application possibilities, which will speed up its use in reality."
The bionic flapping-wing aircraft imitates the flight mode of birds and other creatures flapping their wings. It has light weight, small size and low noise as well as it is bionic, concealable and portable.
It is easily used for hand-thrown take-off and gliding to land which can be used in many situations such as covert reconnaissance in complex environment, emergency rescue and field biological scientific research.
The research team has used their bird-like drone to fly for over 1,500 flight missions in over 10 cities and regions to test out and improve their design and technology in different environment.