PREVIEW

Eat your heart out, Simone Biles - a new gymnastics champion has emerged in the animal world – the globular springtail (Dicyrtomina minuta). This tiny hexapod, barely a couple of millimetres in length, backflips into the air, reaching over 60 times its body height and rotating more than 360 times in a split second. If 1.42 metre-tall Biles could jump as high in relation to her own stature, it would mean she could backflip higher than 85 metres, meaning she'd be able to jump over the head of the Statue of Liberty. There's a very good reason globular springtails can jump this high. Their gymnastic feats are their only defence against predators Now, scientists at North Carolina State University have explained how they do it. Unlike most jumping animals, globular springtails don't use their legs. Instead, they rely on a specialised appendage called a furca, which unfolds from underneath their abdomen. The forked tip of the furca pushes against the ground, propelling them into a rapid backflip.