Against Vibration Theory of Olfaction BSE656A - Neurobiology

Olfaction is the sense of smell. It is the phenemenon of receptors detecting certain properties about the molecules that are known as odorants.The perception of an odour is the result of an extraordinary complex cascade of events. The very first steps of this perception involves the interaction of chemicals with our olfactory neurons[7]. Odour is a property that depends on several highly variable factors. There is a many to many mapping between these factors. Cracking the combinatorial code is, of course, the first step towards our understanding of the complex mechanism involved in the perception of smell. Such a function is performed by the central part of our olfactory system (the olfactory bulb, olfactory cortices, etc.). Beyond that, socalled peri-receptor events, notably implying proteins present in the olfactory mucus, likely contribute to the subtlety of our perception by modulating how the quality, the quantity and the kinetics of the odourant signal are coded.[8, 10]