TRYING TO WORK OFF THOSE BREASTS
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โ€‹A team of turkeys lives at Brown University. These Ivy League fowl have their own dorm room, complete with roommates and beds made of straw. Every morning, they get up and run on a treadmill. All the while, their every motion is recorded.


One of Dr. Robert's subjects running in slow motion.  YouTube: Chris Duffy

Dr. Thomas Roberts is the reason why these turkeys are training for a marathon rather than getting stuffed with breadcrumbs. He's a biologist who studies the way animals move. Dr. Roberts's team of turkey subjects is helping scientists understand how to build more efficient robots, to understand neuromuscular disorders, and to design better prosthetics for humans.

Turkeys are ideal research subjects for a number of reasons. They're a good size, large enough to study but small enough to house easily. "It would be tough to have an ostrich or an emu around," Dr. Roberts said. Plus, turkeys have "a number of anatomical features of their limbs, some of which we're familiar with from Thanksgiving, that make them really good models for studying locomotion."

In case you're wondering how fast turkeys can run, it's pretty impressive. "The turkeys run at a pace that I couldn't sustain," said Dr. Roberts, about a six-minute-mile, although they've been clocked moving even faster than that. Plus, they look damn good doing it.

 

For more cutting edge turkey science, check out Dr. Roberts' recent visit to You're the Expert, a new public radio show. Three comedians try to guess what Dr. Roberts studies all day and then interview him about his work. Featuring: The Daily Show writer Zhubin Parang, standup comedian Myq Kaplan, and Broad City's Jo Firestone.

 

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