Science News

A good sense of smell may have contributed to the development of certain kinds of social functions in Homo sapiens, according to a new study. Scientists used 3D modeling to reconstruct modern human and Neanderthal brains and discovered that the olfactory areas, which govern smell, are larger in humans. Their models also show that humans have larger temporal lobes, regions related to social behavior. Future studies will explore the possibility of a connection between the olfactory and temporal regions of the brain and the evolution of sophisticated social behavior in humans.

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“Smell is very primitive, but at the same time has direct links to the highest centers of the brain,” says Donald Wilson, professor of child and adolescent psychiatry at New York University. Odor receptors in the nose are actually extensions of the olfactory bulb in the brain, which “has fingers on buttons affecting what we eat, with whom we mate, what we’re afraid of.”

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