April 28 : A new study has claimed that the mammalian brain has a greater potential in distinguishing different types of smells than earlier believed.

As part of the study conducted by Leslie Kay and Jennifer Beshel of the University of Chicago, the researchers attached electrodes to the brains of four rats and trained them to distinguish different odours. The electrodes followed the oscillations of the cells in the olfactory bulbs.

Researchers found that rats use oscillations selectively. When smells were quite distinct, their activity was irregular. The oscillations became more regular when smells were similar.

The researchers concluded that smell is often an undervalued sense, because people are more aware of the visual aspects of their perceptions. These visual distractions lead people to ignore their ability to detect smells; something the brain is apparently well equipped to do.

“Olfactory bulb gamma oscillations are dynamically altered to adjust to task demands,” the researchers said.

“This is the first study to look at the ways in which mammals respond to challenges of distinguishing smells by studying actual activity in the olfactory bulb while varying the difficulty of the discrimination,” Kay said.

Another research showed that a rat’s ability to distinguish scent increased if it was exposed to a new odour for an hour a day for less than two weeks.

This improvement comes from an increase in the number of responsive small inhibitory neurons in the olfactory bulb, which leads to improved cooperation and increased oscillations among the cells in the olfactory bulb.

“Olfactory bulb odour response dynamics enhanced by odour enrichment,” researchers said.

The studies may lead researchers to study how the process occurs and how animals increase the presence of the oscillations in a situation-specific manner.

The findings of the research were presented at the annual meeting of the Association for Chemoreception Sciences in Sarasota, Florida. (ANI)