'echolocation' is a correct and usable word in written English.
It refers to the ability of certain animals, such as bats and dolphins, to use sound waves to navigate and locate objects in their environment. Example: The bat flew swiftly through the night, using echolocation to avoid crashing into any obstacles in its path.
As they describe in Biomedical Optics Express, Dr Leitgeb and his colleagues are exploring a technique called optical coherence tomography (OCT), which they think will allow skin cancer to be diagnosed in situ.OCT is a form of optical echolocation.
As a Harvard undergraduate, he discovered that bats produce ultrasonic sounds and avoid objects that reflect these sounds, thus proving that the animals orient themselves by echolocation.
Dolphins and porpoises were found to have the ability to derive information about their environment by listening to echoes of sounds that they have produced (echolocation).
Cetacean sounds can be roughly divided into communication signals and echolocation signals.
The bulk of it is occupied by the spermaceti organ and a fatty (adipose) cushion, both of which somehow function in the emission of sound for echolocation and were known by whalers as the "case" and the "junk," respectively.
Baleen whales (mysticetes) use calls like these for communication and possibly for low-frequency long-range echolocation in orientation and navigation.
Many insects have evolved countermeasures to echolocation, including the ability to hear high frequencies, a strategy of power diving to the ground, and, in some cases, the emission of high-frequency clicks to create acoustic confusion.
In some species these organs serve as receptors of the high-frequency echolocation signals emitted by hunting bats, allowing the moths to initiate escape maneuvers.
These creatures are able to discern objects around them by a process called echolocation; the animal sends out a cry and, by the nature of the echo, is informed of the presence of obstacles or potential prey.
In moths these sensitive organs can perceive the high-pitched sounds emitted by bats as they hunt by echolocation.
Occasionally, when prey density is high or when the bats return to areas where they have hunted successfully before, they will drag their claws through the water for several metres, catching prey at random without using echolocation.
