Human Sense of Smell Rivals That of Dogs, Says Study (theguardian.com)

One scientific analysis is arguing that the human sense of smell has not only been underestimated over the years, but that it may rival that of dogs and rodents. John McGann, a neuroscientist at Rutgers University in New Jersey and the paper's author, said: "For so long people failed to stop and question this claim, even people who study the sense of smell for a living. The fact is the sense of smell is just as good in humans as in other mammals, like rodents and dogs." McGann has reached this unexpected conclusion after spending 14 years studying the olfactory system. The Guardian reports: McGann identifies a 19th century brain surgeon, Paul Broca, as the primary culprit for introducing the notion of inferior human olfaction into the scientific literature. Broca noted that the olfactory bulb -- the brain region that processes odor detection -- is smaller, relative to total brain volume, in people compared with dogs or rats. The discovery inspired Freud's belief that human sexual repression may be linked to our "usually atrophied" sense of smell. In the latest paper, published in Science, McGann points out that in absolute terms the human olfactory bulb is bigger than in many mammals and a literature search revealed that the absolute number olfactory neurons is remarkably consistent across mammals. McGann goes on to deconstruct other metrics that have been used to support the idea that human smelling abilities are limited. Humans have approximately 1,000 odor receptor genes, for instance, compared to 1,100 in mice, which some had taken as confirmation of mouse superiority. However, other work suggests there is not a tight relationship between the number of olfactory genes and smelling ability. One study found that cows have 2,000 such genes - far more than dogs.

Comments

I'm calling horse hockey

[Snotnose]

I can't smell my own BO, let alone a nice stash of coke, weed, or vodka 2 feet from my nose.

Really?

[MrLogic17]

Find me a human who can compete with a bloodhound or beagle in tracking a person, based on smelling a old shirt.

Re:Really?

[ckatko]

Seriously. Just because one study (that hasn't been replicated yet, the fundamental requirement of science) say something, doesn't mean it invalidates ALL of our pragmatic knowledge and experience.

  - Police aren't using humans to track drugs and dead bodies buried under ground for 7 days.

  - As an engineer, it doesn't take a genius to look at the shape of a dog's nose verses other animals to notice the huge mass and evolutionary investment in their noses. We aren't using humans to hunt for truffles. Don't you think in the course of human history it would be easier to use our noses than DOMESTICATE AND TRAIN ANOTHER ANIMAL to learn what we want?

I mean, all we know from this snippet is we MAY have more "oder receptor genes." DO more genes = more smelling ability? And what is ability defined as? Maybe dogs can't smell [as many] types of different smells, but they can smell them BETTER at smaller parts-per-million. They may also be able to smell the DIRECTION the scent is coming from a thousand times stronger than us. Our nose is pointed DOWN, theirs is pointed FORWARD. Evolution doesn't just design stuff like that for shits and giggles.

  I mean, there are so many questions that the only thing we can really do at this point is go "Huh. Interesting." and go about our days until some REAL science starts confirming this study and exploring the actual implications. This is just clickbait at this point unless some actual EXPERTS show up in the comment section to elaborate their experiences and research.

Re:Really?

[rmdingler]

- Police aren't using humans to track drugs and dead bodies buried under ground for 7 days.

You are correct, but they sure are using dogs trained by humans. You have to learn to delegate.

Re: Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

I, a human, smelled this article, which smelled like bullshit well before I opened it.