The project uses a comparative approach to study two behavioral strategies employed in biological systems to optimize the speed and accuracy of spatial search. The two systems studied are human saccadic eye-movement, and path integration in honeybees. Both systems must solve the problems of moving a sensor through an environment to a desired goal. They have separately evolved two strategies to increase the speed and accuracy of this search: an open-loop movement and use of memory. While the open-loop saccadic eye-movement is reasonably well understood, there is very little known about its use of visual memory. In contrast, spatial memory in insect navigation is becoming well understood, but there is still a great deal to understand about how memory interacts with path integration. The experiments in this proposal will attempt to redress the balance by studying the use of spatial memory for saccadic eye-movements, and how spatial memories are used by the insect path integration system. With these studies, the conceptual relationship between two systems, which are occasionally presented together as examples of similar processes, will be better understood.
