A compact body crouches at the base of a trunk, then launches almost vertically, claws locking into bark before you even finish a blink. The animal looks like an oversized, short-legged house cat, yet it is a lynx executing a near‑ballistic jump that sends it several meters up rough wood.The physics of that launch starts in the lynx’s musculoskeletal system rather than in raw size. Short hind limb...More