Emergent Spinning and Orbital Motion in Clustered Wind‐Assisted Flyers

ABSTRACT Nature offers a rich diversity of wind‐assisted flyers, ranging from snowflakes to dandelion seeds and fungal spores. Despite their differences in size, material, and aerodynamic regime, these systems share a common principle: when individual flyers aggregate into clusters, the resulting geometric asymmetry gives rise to emergent behaviors, e.g., spinning, orbital motion, and extended gliding. This cluster‐induced aerodynamic asymmetry represents a general mechanism in passive aerial dispersers, yet it remains poorly understood and rarely studied in a controlled manner. Here, we present a physical model of a wind‐assisted flyer capable of cluster‐induced spinning. The flyers are designed with porous and laser‐cut from office paper. A single flyer exhibits airborne stability due to the formation of vortex rings downstream. When two flyers form a cluster, the clustering handedness determines the spinning velocity. Computational simulations reveal that the torque difference induced by structural asymmetry plays a critical role in determining the mid‐air motion. With experiments, we demonstrate peak autorotation efficiency at 5° angular mismatch between two flyers. Furthermore, we explore mid‐air self‐assembly of flyers driven by aerodynamic interactions, during which dynamic clustering and de‐clustering behaviors are observed, yielding diverse spinning velocities. These findings offer new possibilities for programmable mid‐air clustering motion.