Bangalore, June 6 (IANS) Over 500 delegates, including from American space agency NASA and Britain's Royal Institute of Navigation, will take part in a conference on advances in global navigation systems.

The second international conference of 'Location 2006', an Indian initiative on positioning, navigation and timing, gets under way here Wednesday.

Over 500 delegates are expected to attend the three-day conference that will cover four keynote sessions, a seminar on defence and internal security, panel discussions and technical sessions.

The keynote sessions will be on Global Navigation Satellite System and Emerging Trends in Positioning Technologies. They will focus on latest developments in Global Positioning System (GPS) along with the ground- and space-based augmentation systems.

Among the keynote speakers will be Indian Space Research Organisation programme director Suresh Kibe, Britain's Royal Institute of Navigation director Group Captain David Broughton, Russia's Federal Space Agency deputy director Sergey Revnivykh, and NASA's senior GPS technologist James Miller.

GPS is the only fully functional satellite navigation system. It has become indispensable for modern navigation on land, sea, and air around the world, as well as an important tool for map-making, and land surveying.

Satellite navigation systems allow small electronic devices to determine their location within a few metres using time signals transmitted along a line of sight by radio from satellites.

"GPS has evolved from its military roots to an ideal example of dual-use technology. Defence equipment, which requires real time or post event data of position, velocity and time, works effectively with GPS," organisers said.

The session on Emerging Trends in Positioning Technologies will focus on the increased interest amongst the public and private segment on the usage of positioning technology thta is converging with contemporary technologies to provide cost-saving solutions.

The word navigation is seen by some as having been derived from the Sanskrit word 'navgatih'. The art of navigation is believed to have been born in the Indus river in India over 6,000 years ago.