Olfactory Discrimination Ability of Asian Elephants (Elephas maximus) for Structurally Related Odorants
Abstract
Using a food-rewarded two-choice instrumental conditioning paradigm, we assessed the ability of Asian elephants, Elephas maximus, to discriminate between 2 sets of structurally related odorants. We found that the animals successfully discriminated between all 12 odor pairs involving members of homologous series of aliphatic 1-alcohols, n-aldehydes, 2-ketones, and n-carboxylic acids even when the stimuli differed from each other by only 1 carbon. With all 4 chemical classes, the elephants displayed a positive correlation between discrimination performance and structural similarity of odorants in terms of differences in carbon chain length. The animals also successfully discriminated between all 12 enantiomeric odor pairs tested. An analysis of odor structure-activity relationships suggests that a combination of molecular structural properties rather than a single molecular feature may be responsible for the discriminability of enantiomers. Compared with other species tested previously on the same sets of odor pairs (or on subsets thereof), the Asian elephants performed at least as well as mice and clearly better than human subjects, squirrel monkeys, pigtail macaques, South African fur seals, and honeybees. Further comparisons suggest that neither the relative nor the absolute size of the olfactory bulbs appear to be reliable predictors of between-species differences in olfactory discrimination capabilities. In contrast, we found a positive correlation between the number of functional olfactory receptor genes and the proportion of discriminable enantiomeric odor pairs. Taken together, the results of the present study support the notion that the sense of smell may play an important role in regulating the behavior of Asian elephants.
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Asian elephants can learn to discriminate between structurally related chemical odorants in object-choice tasks, including chemical structures that only differ by one carbon.
“Asian elephants can learn to discriminate between structurally related chemical odorants in object-choice tasks (Arvidsson et al., 2012; Rizvanovic et al., 2013), including chemical structures that only differ by one carbon (Rizvanovic et al., 2013).”
From Do elephants really never forget? What we know about elephant memory and a call for further investigation (2025) · cites this paper as Rizvanovic et al., 2013
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- Authors
- Rizvanovic, A., Amundin, M., & Laska, M.
- Affiliations
- Linköping University (SE)
- ORCID
- Venue
- Chemical Senses
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2012-12-16
- Volume
- 38
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 107-118
- ISSN
- 0379-864X (ISSN-L)
- 1464-3553
- OpenAlex
- W2165397087
- Cited by
- 77
- References
- 52
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 14 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 8 · 2016: 9 · 2015: 8 · 2014: 2 · 2013: 1
- FWCI
- 1.95
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Chemical Senses (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institutes of Health
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Sensory Systems › Olfactory and Sensory Function Studies
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Biomedical Engineering › Advanced Chemical Sensor Technologies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Sensory Systems › Ion Channels and Receptors
- Keywords
- Asian elephant, odor discrimination, structural similarity, enantiomers, aliphatic alcohols, aldehydes, ketones, carboxylic acids, olfactory receptor genes, cross-species comparison, olfactory behavior
- MeSH terms
- Alcohols, Aldehydes, Animals, Carboxylic Acids, Conditioning, Operant, Elephants, Female, Ketones, Odorants, Olfactory Bulb, Stereoisomerism, Olfactory Perception
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