An intrinsic association between olfactory identification and spatial memory in humans

Louisa Dahmani, Raihaan M. Patel, Yiling Yang, M. Mallar Chakravarty, Lesley K. Fellows and Véronique D. Bohbot ()
Additional contact information
Louisa Dahmani: Douglas Mental Health University Institute, McGill University
Raihaan M. Patel: Douglas Mental Health University Institute, McGill University
Yiling Yang: Douglas Mental Health University Institute, McGill University
M. Mallar Chakravarty: Douglas Mental Health University Institute, McGill University
Lesley K. Fellows: Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University
Véronique D. Bohbot: Douglas Mental Health University Institute, McGill University

Nature Communications, 2018, vol. 9, issue 1, 1-12

Abstract: Abstract It was recently proposed that olfaction evolved to aid navigation. Consistent with this hypothesis, olfactory identification and spatial memory are linked to overlapping brain areas which include the orbitofrontal cortex and hippocampus. However, the relationship between these two processes has never been specifically investigated. Here, we show that olfactory identification covaries with spatial memory in humans. We also found that the cortical thickness of the left medial orbitofrontal cortex, and the volume of the right hippocampus, predict both olfactory identification and spatial memory. Finally, we demonstrate deficits in both olfactory identification and spatial memory in patients with lesions of the medial orbitofrontal cortex. Our findings reveal an intrinsic relationship between olfaction and spatial memory that is supported by a shared reliance on the hippocampus and medial orbitofrontal cortex. This relationship may find its roots in the parallel evolution of the olfactory and hippocampal systems.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-06569-4 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:9:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-018-06569-4

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-06569-4

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().