Ideal short-term organic engine
In previous questions on this topic, I've devised a genetically-diverse creature that uses a cold fusion internal engine to provide tremendous amounts of short-term (sprint) energy.
However, there have been several concerns raised about such an internal engine. So I am asking the community, what would be the best solution to the problem of sprint energy?
Constraints:
- Must be able to produce copious amounts of energy on demand
- Must be able to produce energy for up to 10 minutes at a time
- Must be organic
- Must be scalable to creature size (size ranges from caterpillar to whale)
This post was sourced from https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/q/33337. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
1 answer
The power source
There are existing biological power sources that your DNA chimera could use to "power" the muscles, like the organs of an electric eel. The organs could produce electricity and provide an electric shock to stimulate the muscle. Multiple organs could be fired in sequence to provide a sustained burst over a period of time.
I remember a lecturer a while back talking about how frogs have a different type of muscle in their legs that is really good for fast movement. (White muscle maybe? it's been a long time.)
Since your creature has multiple DNA types, it's believable that it would have different types of muscle, possibly layered on top of each other. The normal "red" muscle would be used for normal movement, and the "white" fast twitch muscle would be used as a speed and strength enhancer when needed.
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