Adelaide Sibeaux, Cait Newport, Jonathan P Green, Cecilia Karlsson, Jacob Engelmann, Theresa Burt de Perera
Author Information
Adelaide Sibeaux: Department of Biology, University of Oxford, Zoology Research and Administration Building, 11a Mansfield Road, Oxford, OX1 3SZ, UK. adelaide.sibeaux@biology.ox.ac.uk. ORCID
Cait Newport: Department of Biology, University of Oxford, Zoology Research and Administration Building, 11a Mansfield Road, Oxford, OX1 3SZ, UK.
Jonathan P Green: Department of Biology, University of Oxford, Zoology Research and Administration Building, 11a Mansfield Road, Oxford, OX1 3SZ, UK.
Cecilia Karlsson: Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, CB3 9BB, UK. ORCID
Jacob Engelmann: Faculty of Biology, Bielefeld University, Universitätstrasse 25, Bielefeld, 33615, Germany. ORCID
Theresa Burt de Perera: Department of Biology, University of Oxford, Zoology Research and Administration Building, 11a Mansfield Road, Oxford, OX1 3SZ, UK.
Path integration is a powerful navigational mechanism whereby individuals continuously update their distance and angular vector of movement to calculate their position in relation to their departure location, allowing them to return along the most direct route even across unfamiliar terrain. While path integration has been investigated in several terrestrial animals, it has never been demonstrated in aquatic vertebrates, where movement occurs through volumetric space and sensory cues available for navigation are likely to differ substantially from those in terrestrial environments. By performing displacement experiments with Lamprologus ocellatus, we show evidence consistent with fish using path integration to navigate alongside other mechanisms (allothetic place cues and route recapitulation). These results indicate that the use of path integration is likely to be deeply rooted within the vertebrate phylogeny irrespective of the environment, and suggests that fish may possess a spatial encoding system that parallels that of mammals.
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