 The term "echolocation" was coined by the American zoologist Donald Griffin, whose work with Robert Galambos was the first to convincingly demonstrate its existence in bats in 1938.As Griffin described in his book, the 18th century Italian scientist Lazzaro Spallanzani had, by means of a series of elaborate experiments, concluded that when bats fly at night, they rely on some sense besides vision, but he did not discover that the other sense was hearing.The Swiss physician and naturalist Louis Jurine repeated Spallanzani's experiments (using different species of bat), and concluded that when bats hunt at night, they rely on hearing.