Google announced today that the Advanced Technology and Platforms (ATAP) group of Motorola is developing an experimental smartphone platform that can be used for mobile 3D mapping, reports VentureBeat.

Project Tango is focused on a 4-inch smartphone prototype similar to a Kinect motion camera that can map 3D space.

Tango Project head Johnny Lee described their objective in a blog: "We are physical beings that live in a 3D world. Yet our mobile devices assume that physical world ends at the boundaries of the screen. The goal of Project Tango is to give mobile devices a human-scale understanding of space and motion."

What sets Tango apart is its ability to accommodate over a quarter million 3D measurements per second. The platform uses those measurements to create a 3D model in real time, the report explained.

Google could use Tango to open opportunities in mobile gaming and indoor mapping. But for now, it needs more developers for the projects. Right now, the search giant has 200 developer units which will be released by mid-March, VentureBeat reported.