ECHOLOCATION

ECHOLOCATION

Subject : Science & tech

Context : The Durham research, published on Wednesday in the journal PLOS One, focuses on how easily visually impaired people can learn echolocation, and whether age influences learning.

Concept :

Echolocation

• Echolocation, also called bio sonar, is a biological sonar used by several animal species. Echolocating animals emit calls out to the environment and listen to the echoes of those calls that return from various objects near them.
• They use these echoes to locate and identify the objects. Echolocation is used for navigation, foraging, and hunting in various environments.
• Echolocating animals include some mammals (most notably Laurasiatheria) and a few birds.
• Especially some bat species and odontocetes (toothed whales and dolphins), but also in simpler forms in other groups such as shrews, and two cave dwelling bird groups, the so-called cave swiftlets in the genus Aerodramus (formerly Collocalia) and the unrelated Oilbird Steatorniscaripensis.

Durham study

• The researchers organised a 10-week training programme, in which 12 blind and 14 sighted volunteers aged between 21 and 79 were taught click-based echolocation, as per BBC Science Focus.
• The volunteers were trained in distinguishing between the size of objects, orientation perception and virtual navigation.
• At the end of the training, the participants had been able to improve their ability to navigate using clicking noises either from one’s mouth, walking cane taps or footsteps.