Michael LaBarbera, a professor of biomechanics at the University of Chicago, has gained a reputation as a man unafraid to tackle life’s knottier mysteries. He once wrote a paper explaining why animals don’t have wheels. Most famously, he is the author of “The Biology of B-Movie Monsters,” a treatise in which he explored the science behind films like “Them!” and “Attack of the Giant Leeches.” And his findings represent good news (for humans, anyway): The shrinking, enlarging, and sundry biological tinkering employed in creature-feature disaster flicks of the 1950s and ’60s would have been a disaster mainly for the creatures themselves.

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  Mothra, without a new set of tracheal tubes, would have suffocated before getting off the ground, says University of Chicago professor Michael LaBarbera.
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  The 50-Foot Woman would break a leg if she took a single step, said LaBarbera, the author of "The Biology of B-Movie Monsters."
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  Before destroying the Golden Gate Bridge in “It Came From Beneath the Sea,” the giant octopus in the film would have suffered debilitating blood pressure problems.
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  "The Incredible Shrinking Man" should use thrust weapons, like a spear, rather than weapons that use momentum, like a hammer.
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  King Kong, in the absence of a refigured skeletal system, would have crumpled into a heap before having a chance to crush a single human.
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  LaBarbera has difficulty deciding what his favorite monster movie is, but thinks the shoddiest example of the genre is "The Giant Claw,"