Humans and mice express similar olfactory preferences

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Olfactory perception
• Chemosensation

Background:

• Odor pleasantness significantly impacts human social interactions and eating habits.
• Olfactory preferences are shaped by experience but may also depend on molecular properties.
• The hypothesis that odor hedonic value is predetermined by molecular structure is under investigation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if odor pleasantness is conserved across species.
• To determine if physicochemical properties of odorants predict olfactory preferences in humans and mice.
• To explore the link between molecular structure and cross-species olfactory hedonic perception.

Main Methods:

• Behavioral experiments with mice and psychophysical studies with humans.
• Measuring investigation time in mice and sniffing duration in humans for various odorants.
• Correlating human pleasantness ratings and mouse investigation times with molecular physicochemical properties.

Main Results:

• Odorants humans find pleasant were investigated longer by mice and sniffed longer by humans.
• Both human pleasantness ratings and mouse investigation times correlated with molecular physicochemical properties.
• A component of olfactory hedonic perception appears to be conserved across species.

Conclusions:

• Odor preferences are partly predetermined by the physicochemical structure of odorant molecules.
• Shared mammalian odor preferences suggest a conserved biological basis for olfactory hedonic perception.
• These findings provide new avenues for studying the neural basis of hedonic perception.