Contact Information
(267) 519-4660
Joel Mainland
Assistant Member
Education
Ph.D., Neuroscience, University of California, Berkeley
Research Summary
A fundamental problem in neuroscience is mapping the physical properties of a stimulus to perceptual characteristics. In vision, wavelength translates into color; in audition, frequency translates into pitch. By contrast, the mapping from chemical structure to olfactory percept is unknown. In other words, there is not a scientist or perfumer in the world who can view a novel molecular structure and predict how it will smell. My research goal is to develop a predictive model relating molecular structure and olfactory perception using a combined psychophysical and molecular approach.
Keywords
Olfaction, psychophysics, cell culture, neuroscience, genetics, behavioral analysis
Recent Publications
Lunde, K.; Egelandsdal, B.; Skuterud, E.; Mainland, J.D.; Lea, T.; Hersleth, M. & Matsunami, H. (In Press) “Genetic variation of an odorant receptor OR7D4 and sensory perception of cooked meat containing androstenon.” PLOS One.
McRae, J.F.; Mainland, J.D.; Jaeger, S.R.; Adipietro, K.A.; Matsunami, H.; Newcomb, R.D. (In Press) “Genetic variation in the odorant receptor OR2J3 is associated with the ability to detect the ‘grassy’ smelling odor, cis-3-hexen-1-ol.” Chemical Senses.
Saito, H.*; Chi, Q.; Zhuang, H.; Matsunami, H. and Mainland, J. D.* (2009) “Odor coding by a mammalian receptor repertoire.” Science Signaling 2.60, ra9. (*These authors contributed equally to this work)
Mainland, J. D.; Sobel, N. (2006) “The sniff is part of the olfactory percept.” Chemical Senses. 31.2, 181-96.
Mainland, J. D.; Johnson, B. N.; Khan, R.; Ivry, R. B.; Sobel, N. (2005) “Olfactory impairments in patients with unilateral cerebellar lesions are selective to inputs from the contralesional nostril.” The Journal of Neuroscience. 25.27, 6362-71.
Mainland, J. D.; Bremner, E. A.; Young, N.; Johnson, B. N.; Khan, R. M.; Bensafi, M.; Sobel, N. (2002) “Olfactory plasticity: One nostril knows what the other nostril learns.” Nature 419.6909, 802.
