<P> The modern boomerang is often computer - aided designed with precision airfoils . The number of "wings" is often more than 2 as more lift is provided by 3 or 4 wings than by 2 . </P> <P> In 1992, German astronaut Ulf Merbold performed an experiment aboard Spacelab that established that boomerangs function in zero gravity as they do on Earth . French Astronaut Jean - François Clervoy aboard MIR repeated this in 1997 . In 2008, Japanese astronaut Takao Doi again repeated the experiment on board the International Space Station . </P> <P> It is thought by some that the shape and elliptical flight path of the returning boomerang makes it useful for hunting birds and small animals, or that noise generated by the movement of the boomerang through the air, or, by a skilled thrower, lightly clipping leaves of a tree whose branches house birds, would help scare the birds towards the thrower . It is further supposed by some that this was used to frighten flocks or groups of birds into nets that were usually strung up between trees or thrown by hidden hunters . In southeastern Australia, it is claimed that boomerangs were made to hover over a flock of ducks; mistaking it for a hawk, the ducks would dive away, toward hunters armed with nets or clubs . Despite these notions and similar claims by a few European writers, there is no independently contemporaneous record of any aboriginal peoples using a returning boomerang as a weapon . </P> <P> Traditionally, most boomerangs used by aboriginal groups in Australia were' non-returning' . These weapons, sometimes called "throwsticks" or "kylies", were used for hunting a variety of prey, from kangaroos to parrots; at a range of about 100 metres (330 ft), a 2 - kg (4.4 lb) non-returning boomerang could inflict mortal injury to a large animal . A throwstick thrown nearly horizontally may fly in a nearly straight path and could fell a kangaroo on impact to the legs or knees, while the long - necked emu could be killed by a blow to the neck . Hooked non-returning boomerangs, known as "beaked kylies", used in northern Central Australia, have been claimed to kill multiple birds when thrown into a dense flock . It should be noted that throwsticks are used as multi-purpose tools by today's aboriginal peoples, and besides throwing could be wielded as clubs, used for digging, used to start friction fires, and are sonorous when two are struck together . </P>

Who invented the boomerang and what was its original purpose