Brain cells locate themselves and their friends in space. This is the discovery that earned a Nobel Prize in the 2014. Now a new study published in 'Science' explores the role of the hippocampus and 'Gps' present in the brain. A 'device' equipped with radar that can also locate other people, animals or objects in the surrounding space. The discovery was obtained by a Japanese team from the Riken Brain Science Institute analyzing the rats. The authors, Shigeyoshi Fujisawa and colleagues, suggest that the hippocampus has four different types of spatial models, one for autolocation, one for identifying others, one third for joint positions, and the last for common positions, which it is activated when the person or the other is present. This interpretation extends the theory of the existing cognitive map on how the hippocampus processes spatial places and memories. "We think that the cognitive map in the hippocampus is not just to know where the self is", says Fujisawa, "but also to trace the positions of other people, animals or objects and to understand the spatial environment around us.
