What a locust can teach us about how neuromodulators alter odor processing

AI Summary

Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis used locusts to investigate how neuromodulators change odor processing and odor-driven behavior. The work may help explain why the same smell can prompt different responses depending on a person's experience or state.

When you walk into a bakery and smell fresh cookies, the enticing smell draws you in. After you eat a handful of cookies, though, the same smell likely doesn't send you back for more. Researchers in the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis sought to determine the biological mechanisms in the brain that controllably alters odor-evoked behavior by using an unlikely model—a locust.