Re: How Humans Detect Pheromones

Rich Travsky <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>  http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994362
> 
>  Researchers may have taken a big step towards solving the mystery of how
>  humans detect pheromones.
> 
>  Animals secrete pheromones to communicate to others of their species
>  information about their gender or reproductive state. The chemical
>  signals are detected by a specialised sensory system called the
>  vomeronasal organ (VMO). This then activates specific behavioral or
>  physiological responses in the animal.
> 
>  But scientists have never been able to identify a VMO in humans, despite
>  evidence that they do respond to pheromones. For example, sweat from an
>  ovulating woman can alter the timing of the menstrual cycle of other
>  women. Brains scans have also shown that humans can respond to
>  pheromones.
> 
>  Now, researchers from Duke University, North Carolina, have found that
>  pheromones can also activate the main olfactory system in mice. This
>  suggests humans could respond to pheromones through the regular system
>  they use to smell.
> 
>  Neuroscientist Larry Katz and his colleagues found that certain neurons
>  in the mouse olfactory bulb respond specifically to a pheromone found in
>  the urine of male mice. It is the first direct evidence that the main
>  olfactory system can respond to these cues.
> 
>  The team is now trying to determine how the process may work in humans.
>  "But we don't generally use urine as a social signal," notes Katz.
>  ...
> 
> 
> "don't generally use urine as a social signal" - not outside of college
> campuses, anyways...

There's a lovely counterexample in the Jack Nicholson film "Wolf".
-- 
John Wilkins wilkins.id.au
For long you live and high you fly, 
and smiles you'll give and tears you'll cry
and all you touch and all you see is all your life will ever be