How does smell work?
Discussion
The 'simple' act of being able to smell something.
Sounds straight forward but having watched a TV program aprarently it is not.
To set off the process a molecule of a certain substance would have to travel up the nose and reach the smell receptors that are linked to your brain.
These smell receptors 'grab' the molecule and 'investigate' it.
As the brain works on the motion of electrons in order signals can be sent and received it is assumed that electrons will do the 'investigation' of the molecule.
But how does a single (or multiple) electron(s) 'investigate' a molecule in order to then send some 'information' about it to the brain?
The TV program showed the electron 'passing through' the molecule in a simple animation, but this just left the question as to what has changed to that electron in order it now posesses information about the molecule?
Any more insight from the knowledgable?
Sounds straight forward but having watched a TV program aprarently it is not.
To set off the process a molecule of a certain substance would have to travel up the nose and reach the smell receptors that are linked to your brain.
These smell receptors 'grab' the molecule and 'investigate' it.
As the brain works on the motion of electrons in order signals can be sent and received it is assumed that electrons will do the 'investigation' of the molecule.
But how does a single (or multiple) electron(s) 'investigate' a molecule in order to then send some 'information' about it to the brain?
The TV program showed the electron 'passing through' the molecule in a simple animation, but this just left the question as to what has changed to that electron in order it now posesses information about the molecule?
Any more insight from the knowledgable?
Shaolin said:
As far as I'm aware it's about molecular receptors.
Molecule sniffed up conk binds/fits to a particular receptor protein which fires off an action potential if it's the right shape. A range of receptors send their messages to the brain which analyses them all and comes up with a decision such as "bacon" or "fart".
Having an enhanced smell bit of the brain results in being able to cross reference associated smells and probably compare them to past smells. As our sense of smell is so poor we probably can't imagine what it is like for dogs who have a much greater experience and sensitivity any more than we can imagine a fish lateral line sense.
Sounds very plausible.Molecule sniffed up conk binds/fits to a particular receptor protein which fires off an action potential if it's the right shape. A range of receptors send their messages to the brain which analyses them all and comes up with a decision such as "bacon" or "fart".
Having an enhanced smell bit of the brain results in being able to cross reference associated smells and probably compare them to past smells. As our sense of smell is so poor we probably can't imagine what it is like for dogs who have a much greater experience and sensitivity any more than we can imagine a fish lateral line sense.
The TV program that I saw however showed it on an electron level whereby the receptors within the nose sent electrons 'through' the scent molecules in order they could be 'interrogated'. Maybe this is what you mean when you say "action potential"?
The message from the TV program being that it relied on the uncertainty principal (schrodinger's cat and all that) in order the electron can be both sides of the scent molecule in order that the correct signal could be sent back to the brain.
How this method works over any another method was not highlighted within the program but as the Science topics of late have been discussing such details I thought this may 'fit in'.
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