Assessing odour annoyance generated by landfill areas involves a number of difficulties due to the fugitive, diffuse and multiple characters of odour sources. Analyses of ambient air by GC-MS, spot FID measurements or the determination of the odour concentration by dynamic olfactometry on the basis of samples collected through flux chambers, while providing valuable results, do not allow to enc...

This paper describes current progress of a project that uses naïve physics to enable a robot to perform efficient odour localisation. Odour localisation is the problem of finding the source of an odour or other volatile chemical. Performing this effectively could lead to many humanitarian and other valuable applications. Current techniques utilise reactive control schemes requiring the robot to...

The major histocompatibility complex (MHC) is an extraordinarily diverse cluster of genes that play a key role in the immune system. MHC gene products are also found in various body secretions, leading to the suggestion that MHC genotypes are linked to unique individual odourtypes that animals use to assess the suitability of other individuals as potential mates or social partners. We investiga...

This study addressed the question of the possible functional relevance of two different oscillatory activities, beta and gamma (15-40 and 60-90 Hz, respectively) for perception and memory processes in olfactory areas of mammals. Local field potentials were recorded near relay olfactory bulb neurons while rats performed an olfactory discrimination task. Signals reflected the mass activity from t...

Evarcha culicivora, a jumping spider from East Africa, specialises in feeding indirectly on vertebrate blood by choosing blood-carrying mosquitoes as preferred prey. Previous studies have shown that this predator can identify its preferred prey by sight alone and also by odour alone. Here we investigate how vision and olfaction work together. Our findings show that, for E. culicivora, cross-mod...

An instrument for electronic odour sensing has been developed and used to classify many different materials, including beers, spirits and alcohols. The next stage in development is to begin to relate subjective odour descriptors (e.g. fruity, minty) to quantitative sensor array measurements. Both neural network and multivariate statistical techniques are required to accomplish this task . The u...

Trimethylaminuria (fish malodour syndrome) is a rare genetic metabolic disorder presented with a body odour which smells like a decaying fish. This odour is highly objectionable, that can be destructive for the social, and work life of the patient. Trimethylamine is derived from the intestinal bacterial degradation of foods that are rich of choline and carnitine. Trimethylamine is normally oxid...

Previous findings of intramodal but not of intermodal blocking in foraging honeybees prompted a new series of experiments with colours, odours, a proximal visual landmark, and a localized geomagnetic anomaly as stimuli. In Experiments 1-2, the landmark was blocked by both colour and odour. In Experiments 3-6, the anomaly was blocked by both colour and odour, but the anomaly failed to block eith...

A thermoplastically extruded snack was produced from different blends of corn grits and silver carp minced meat. Response Surface Methodology (RSM) was used to study the effect of fish meat content and to optimize the feed composition. Fourteen treatments from central composite design considering minced fish content (0-3 kg) and corn (7-10 kg) were used as the independent variables. The expansi...