Urban Myth - Fingerprints Improve Grip
Friday, June 12, 2009 - 08:07
in Psychology & Sociology
Fingerprints are essential for crime dramas and look nicely distinct for each of us but what are fingerprints really for? According to Roland Ennos, from the University of Manchester, other primates and tree-climbing koalas have fingerprints and some South American monkeys have ridged pads on their tree-gripping tails, so everyone presumed that fingerprints are there to help us hang onto objects that we grasp. This theory that fingerprints increase friction between the skin and whatever we grab onto has been around for over 100 years, but no one had directly tested the idea. read more
Read the whole article on Scientific Blogging
More from Scientific Blogging
Related
- Urban myth disproved: Fingerprints do not improve grip frictionFri, 12 Jun 2009, 1:38:08 EDT
- Fingerprint technology beats world's toughest tests ... including 100s of builders' thumbsMon, 26 Oct 2009, 9:44:45 EDT
- Fingerprints provide clues to more than just identityThu, 7 Aug 2008, 14:29:44 EDT
- Researchers give high marks to new technology for fingerprint identificationThu, 23 Apr 2009, 10:49:52 EDT
- Fingerprint analysis technique could be used to identify bombmakersTue, 26 Aug 2008, 9:42:54 EDT