Related Experiment Video
Updated: Sep 23, 2025

Three Dimensional Vestibular Ocular Reflex Testing Using a Six Degrees of Freedom Motion Platform
Published on: May 23, 2013
Oscillators and servomechanisms in orientation and navigation, and sometimes in cognition
1School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University, Sydney, North Ryde, NSW 2109, Australia.
Abstract:
Navigational mechanisms have been characterized as servomechanisms. A navigational servomechanism specifies a goal state to strive for. Discrepancies between the perceived current state and the goal state specify error. Servomechanisms adjust the course of travel to reduce the error. I now add that navigational servomechanisms work with oscillators, periodic movements of effectors that drive locomotion. I illustrate this concept selectively over a vast range of scales of travel from micrometres in bacteria to thousands of kilometres in sea turtles. The servomechanisms differ in sophistication, with some interrupting forward motion occasionally or changing travel speed in kineses and others adjusting the direction of travel in taxes. I suggest that in other realms of life as well, especially in cognition, servomechanisms work with oscillators.
Related Concept Videos
Gyroscope
Major Somatic Sensory Pathways
Mechanism of Ciliary Motion
The cilia are made up of microtubules in a 9+2 arrangement, with nine microtubule doublet ring bundles, surrounding a pair of central singlet microtubule bundles. The doublet microtubule bundles are...
Gyroscope: Precession
Equilibrium and Balance
The Vestibular System

