Geometry and navigation

In vertebrate animals, the geometric arrangement of surfaces in an environment has been shown to play an important role in relocating a desired place. In such relocation tasks, an animal is typically first shown a target location in a rectangular enclosure. After being disoriented, it then has the task of relocating the target. Aside from the geometric shape of the enclosure, other nongeometric or featural cues are typically available. These include colours of walls, objects serving as landmarks, or smells. An often reported pattern of results is preferred reliance on the geometric cues, sometimes to the exclusion of nongeometric cues. Various axes of space, shape parameters that include principal axes and axes of symmetry, may play a role in how animals use geometric information to determine which direction is which. Some work on robotics related to the geometry literature is presented and the issue of modularity is discussed.