Susan Allen, age 10, of Pittsford, New York, for her question:

How does a  bee, buzz?

A flapping flag makes cracking sounds by shifting and bashing batches of gaseous air molecules. The whistling song of the wind through the trees comes partly from brushing leaves and partly from displaced pockets of air. A sprightly pinwheel creates a whir by bashing through lazy air molecules. So does a breezy electric fan. A busy little bee whips up similar disturbances in the air with her tiny wings. Her miniature fans of delicate gauze beat so fast that they hum a buzzy song as she flies on her way.

The bee's wings move too fast for human eyes to see. An examination of her small body shows that she has two half pairs, two wings on each side. In flight, the two on each shoulder lock together to form a single wing. She can move her two working wings up and dox m or forward and backward. In flight, she darts forward or backwards or sideways or hovers in one spot. During her aerial maneuvers, she beats her wings many hundreds of times a minute, stirring up a breezy buzzing song in the air.