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Chemical Senses 2005 30(Supplement 1):i3-i5; doi:10.1093/chemse/bjh085
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Chemical Senses Vol. 30 No. suppl 1 © Oxford University Press 2005; all rights reserved

Outline of a Theory of Olfactory Processing and its Relevance to Humans

Gordon M. Shepherd

Department of Neurobiology, Yale University School of Medicine, 333 Cedar Street, New Haven, CT 06510, USA

Correspondence to be sent to: Gordon M. Shepherd, e-mail: gordon.shepherd@yale.edu

Key words: flavor mechanisms, molecular determinants, odor maps, olfactory glomeruli, olfactory microcircuits, olfactory receptor genes

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.


   Introduction
 
Two traditional beliefs about olfaction are that the system is poorly understood and that it functions poorly in humans. An outline of a theory of olfactory processing has in fact been emerging for many years (Rall and Shepherd, 1968Go; Stewart et al., 1979Go; Haberly, 1985Go; Lancet, 1986Go; Buck and Axel, 1991Go; Shepherd, 1991Go; Imamura et al., 1992Go; Mori and Shepherd, 1994Go; Mombaerts, 2004Go; Wilson, 2004Go). I will first briefly update the theory based on evidence from many recent studies, a consensus that is not widely appreciated because it is multilevel, multidisciplinary and cross-phylogenetic. I will then consider new evidence that evolution has produced in humans an excellent overall sense of smell and, combined with taste and somatosensation and other inputs, the best sense of flavor in the animal world. This should give a new emphasis to the importance . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   The primitives of smell are odor molecule determinants
 

   Receptor cells encode odor molecule determinants
 

   Olfactory glomeruli encode odor molecule determinants in odor maps (odor images)
 

   The odor image is processed by microcircuits to produce a context-enriched output to the olfactory cortex
 

   The olfactory cortex functions as a content-addressable memory system
 

   Perception of smell and flavor are neocortical higher cognitive functions
 

   The importance of smell and flavor for human evolution and behavior
 

   Summary
 

   Acknowledgements
 

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