If you’re interested in scent detection you’ll find this article interesting. Here are some excerpts and a link to the full article.
“Training of dogs to recognise explosives could be quicker and more effective following research by animal behaviour experts.”
“The study will explore whether dogs can be trained to recognise the significance of a group of odours, rather than having to learn each scent individually.”
“Helen Zulch, clinical animal behaviour specialist, said: “There is a need to develop more generic training approaches as current methods are fairly laborious. In this study we will be testing whether a dog can be taught a general rule for a group of odours and then apply that knowledge to a new situation, involving scents it has never encountered. We know dogs can categorise visual stimuli, so the aim of this study is to find out whether dogs are able to categorise odours in a similar manner.””
