You smell with your body, not just your nose | Jennifer Pluznick

TED Talks Daily

TED

Creativity, Ted Podcast, Ted Talks Daily, Business, Design, Inspiration, Society & Culture, Science, Technology, Education, Tech Demo, Ted Talks, Ted, Entertainment, Tedtalks

4.1 • 11.9K Ratings

🗓️ 27 July 2017

⏱️ 7 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Do your kidneys have a sense of smell? Turns out, the same tiny scent detectors found in your nose are also found in some pretty unexpected places -- like your muscles, kidneys and even your lungs. In this quick talk (filled with weird facts), physiologist Jennifer Pluznick explains why they're there and what they do.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This TED Talk features physiologist Jennifer Plusnik recorded live at TEDmed 2016.
0:09.2	Here's a question for you.
0:12.0	How many different scents do you think you can smell and maybe even identify with accuracy?
0:19.6	100?
0:20.9	300? A thousand? can identify with accuracy? 100?
0:23.1	300?
0:25.6	1,000?
0:30.1	One study estimates that humans can detect
0:33.3	up to one trillion different odors.
0:35.0	A trillion.
0:36.8	It's hard to imagine,
0:40.6	but your nose has the molecular machinery to make it happen.
0:45.2	Alphactory receptors, tiny scent detectors,
0:47.3	are packed into your nose,
0:50.2	each one patiently waiting to be activated by the odor or ligand that it's been assigned to detect.
1:01.0	It turns out we humans, like all vertebrates, have lots of olfactory receptors. In fact, more of our DNA is devoted to genes for different olfactory receptors
1:08.0	than for any other type of protein. Why is that? Could olfactory receptors be
1:16.3	doing something else in addition to allowing us to smell? In 1991, Linda Buck and Richard Axel
1:26.0	uncovered the molecular identity of olfactory receptors' work,
1:30.3	which ultimately led to a Nobel Prize.
1:33.3	At the time, we all assumed that these receptors were only found in the nose.
1:39.3	However, about a year or so later, a report emerged of an olfactory receptor expressed in a tissue other than the nose.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from TED, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of TED and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.