Detection and classification of natural odors with an in vivo bioelectronic nose

The mammalian olfactory system is recognized as one of the most effective chemosensing systems. We thus investigated the potential of utilizing the rat's olfactory system to detect odors. By chronically coupling multiple microelectrodes to olfactory bulb of behaving rats, we extract an array of mitral/tufted cells (M/Ts) which could generate odor-specific temporal patterns of neural discharge. We performed multidimensional analysis of recorded M/Ts, finding that natural odors released from different fruit lead to distinct odor response patterns. Thus an array of M/Ts carried sufficient information to discriminate odors. This novel brain-machine interface using rat's olfaction presents a promising method for odor detection and discrimination, and it is the first step towards in vivo bioelectronic nose equipped with biological olfaction and artificial devices.