Scientists in Scotland hope to mimic bat radar to locate and identify tumours hidden deep inside the body.
Bats navigate and hunt insect prey by sending out pulses of sound and listening to the reflected echoes.
The team is looking at using the same principle to identify hidden tumours with ultrasound.
According to a report in The Engineer magazine, the research is based on the way that bats, like dolphins and whales, have a sophisticated ability to tailor their ultrasound signals to individual targets.
These "acoustic codes" are used to identify different kinds of object.
clipped from: news.bbc.co.uk 