Vortex interactions of two burst-and-coast swimmers in a side-by-side arrangement

Both schooling behavior and burst-and-coast gait could improve fish swimming performance. The extent to which fish can improve their swimming performance by combining these two strategies is still unknown. By examining two self-propelled pitching foils positioned side-by-side at different duty cycles (DC), we examine swimming speed and cost of transport efficiency (CoT) using the open-source immersed boundary software IBAMR. We find that a stable schooling formation can only be maintained if both foils employ similar and moderate DC values. In these cases, vortex interactions increase foils’ lateral movements, but not their swimming speed or efficiency. Additionally, we examine vortex interactions in both “schooling" and “fission" scenarios (which are determined by DC). The research provides useful insights into fish behavior and valuable information for designing bio-inspired underwater robots.