Navigation research

Whereas originally the term Navigation applies to the process of directing a ship to a destination, Navigation research deals with fundamental aspects of navigation in general. It can be defined as "The process of determining and maintaining a course or trajectory to a goal location" (Franz, Mallot, 2000). It concerns basically all moving agents, biological or artificial, autonomous or remote-controlled.

Franz and Mallot proposed a navigation hierarchy (Robotics and Autonomous Systems 30 (2000), 133-153):

There are two basic methods for navigation:


 * Egocentric navigation also known as Idiothetic navigation
 * Allocentric navigation also known as Allothetic navigation