Cat Physics

Apparently cats don't just scoop up water with their tongues like their sloppy housemates who bark.
      NPR reports that the journal Science has published an exhaustive study of how cats drink.
     Roman Stocker, an author of the study and an associate professor at MIT who specializes in fluid mechanics. and his colleagues spent hours filming cats lapping.
Cats of all sizes, from tabbies to tigers, have a very elaborate way of drinking. First, they move the tip of their tongue onto the surface of the water to flick the water up so that a little jet of liquid flies into the air. Then, in a flash, they catch the jet in their mouth.
     "They really know how to do it perfectly, almost as if they're doing the equations in their head," said Pedro Reis, a co-author of the study and assistant professor at MIT.
     What nature does is not necessarily the best way to do things," says David Hu, a researcher at Georgia Tech. "I think that dogs generally have a better way to do it."
     Hu owns a poodle.