The pappus creates a swirling bubble of air in the low-pressure region above the structure (seen at right with a seed in a wind tunnel). The pappus is key to making this work.

The researchers fixed the size of the simulated pappus and varied the porosity of the pappus by changing the number of filaments in it. According to their calculations, the ideal number of filaments ...

A pappus has 100–110 filaments, which together have a large surface compared to the area of the dandelion seed it bears. Scientists had thought that dandelion seed can fly thanks the large drag force ...