Flying Parasitic Worms Use This Superpower to Ambush Prey Midair

Physics can get real strange on the microscopic level. For tiny creatures living on this scale, these eccentricities are what allow them to thrive despite their size—including a worm that researchers dub as one of the “smallest, best jumpers in the world.”

For a recent paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers investigated the odd physics of a “worm-charging mechanism,” which enables S. carpocapsae, a parasitic roundworm, to jump onto aerial prey using…