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Abstract

True flies — such as hoverflies or the blow fly Calliphora vicina — have breathtaking aerobatic capabilities due to a very elaborate flight apparatus. Not only do they beat their wings up to 150 times per second, but they have a gearbox with three gears in the wing joint1, and use non-stationary aerodynamics to generate exceptionally large flight forces2. These flies also show masterly control as they fly around obstacles and through turbulent air, and the way in which they do this is revealed in part by Chan et al.3 in Science. The authors report unexpected features of the ‘gyroscopic’ sense organs that tell the fly about its rotations in space.