News tagged with sense of smell

Researchers find gene critical to sense of smell in fruit fly

(Medical Xpress) -- Fruit flies don't have noses, but a huge part of their brains is dedicated to processing smells. Flies probably rely on the sense of smell more than any other sense for essential activities ...

Biology / Biotechnology

created Jan 19, 2012 | popularity 3 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Carbon dioxide affecting fish brains: study

Rising human carbon dioxide emissions may be affecting the brains and central nervous systems of sea fish, with serious consequences for their survival, according to new research.

Space & Earth / Environment

created Jan 16, 2012 | popularity 4.1 / 5 (15) | comments 15

Did a good sense of smell give us an evolutionary advantage over Neanderthals?

(PhysOrg.com) -- Our sense of smell may have been as important as language in helping to give us, modern humans, an evolutionary advantage over other human relatives such as the Neanderthals, scientists report ...

Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils

created Dec 13, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (1) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Neuroscientists find genetic trigger that makes stem cells differentiate in nose epithelia

University of California, Berkeley, neuroscientists have discovered a genetic trigger that makes the nose renew its smell sensors, providing hope for new therapies for people who have lost their sense of smell ...

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Dec 07, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Early sign of Alzheimer's reversed in lab

One of the earliest known impairments caused by Alzheimer's disease - loss of sense of smell – can be restored by removing a plaque-forming protein in a mouse model of the disease, a study led by a Case Western Reserve ...

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Nov 30, 2011 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (8) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Researcher finds elderly lose ability to distinguish between odors

Scientists studying how the sense of smell changes as people age, found that olfactory sensory neurons in those 60 and over showed an unexpected response to odor that made it more difficult to distinguish specific smells, ...

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Nov 10, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Alzheimer's protein kills nerve cells in nose

A protein linked to Alzheimer's disease kills nerve cells that detect odors, according to an animal study in the September 28 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience. The findings shed light on why people with Alzheimer's diseas ...

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Sep 27, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Scientists discover an organizing principle for our sense of smell

The fact that certain smells cause us pleasure or disgust would seem to be a matter of personal taste. But new research at the Weizmann Institute shows that odors can be rated on a scale of pleasantness, and this turns out ...

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Sep 26, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Smells may help birds find their homes, avoid inbreeding

Birds may have a more highly developed sense of smell than researchers previously thought, contend scholars who have found that penguins may use smell to determine if they are related to a potential mate.

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Sep 21, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Not senseless -- watching the brain relearning the sense of smell

Neural and biochemical processes that are affected by the loss of olfactory sensory perception are now being explored. These studies provide insight into the effects of the loss of smell on corresponding relevant ...

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created Jun 29, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

The smell of danger: Rodent olfaction and the chemistry of instinct

The mechanics of instinctive behavior are mysterious. Even something as simple as the question of how a mouse can use its powerful sense of smell to detect and evade predators, including species it has never met before, has ...

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Jun 28, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Ocean acidification leaves clownfish deaf to predators

(PhysOrg.com) -- Since the Industrial Revolution, over half of all the CO2 produced by burning fossil fuels has been absorbed by the ocean, making pH drop faster than any time in the last 650,000 years and ...

Biology / Ecology

created Jun 01, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Stinky feet could pave the way for better ways to stop mosquitoes

With Memorial Day weekend approaching and temperatures across the nation steadily increase to summertime highs, thoughts turn to picnics, ballgames -- and bug bites. Now, a new way of stopping mosquitoes could ...

Biology / Other

created May 27, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (3) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Large brains in mammals first evolved for better sense of smell

Paleontologists have often wondered why mammals—including humans—evolved to have larger brains than other animals. A team of paleontologists now believe that large brains may have developed in mammals ...

Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils

created May 19, 2011 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (3) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

What rat breath can teach us about food preference, sense of smell and taste

(Medical Xpress) -- Would your favorite dinner taste the same if you could not smell it? Does a sense of smell require a sense of taste? Katz, an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience, set out to find some answers.

Medicine & Health / Neuroscience

created May 02, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Olfaction

Olfaction (also known as olfactics or smell) refers to the sense of smell. This sense is mediated by specialized sensory cells of the nasal cavity of vertebrates, and, by analogy, sensory cells of the antennae of invertebrates. For air-breathing animals, the olfactory system detects volatile or, in the case of the accessory olfactory system, fluid-phase chemicals. For water-dwelling organisms, e.g., fish or crustaceans, the chemicals are present in the surrounding aqueous medium. Olfaction, along with taste, is a form of chemoreception. The chemicals themselves which activate the olfactory system, generally at very low concentrations, are called odors.

For more information about Olfaction, read the full article at Wikipedia.
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