Bees give the buzz about smells | Offbeat | Weird News, Odd and Freaky Stories in Ipswich

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THE Queensland Brain Institute is buzzing with the lessons to be learned from bees.

Scientists at the University of Queensland's brain institute have found through the study of honey bees that the brain has an advanced ability to isolate specific odours and recollect smells.

The researchers say their discovery may have profound implications for understanding mental illness, as well as for farming.

A scent is made up of many individual elements, and it's been found that honey bees pick only a handful of so-called 'key odorants' out of every complex aroma.

This saves their brains being overwhelmed with information.

"They may remember just two or three odorants from a couple of hundred - the rest are ignored," lead researcher Dr Judith Reinhard said.

Now the focus for the QBI scientists will be whether humans use the same technique of learning specific key odorants so our brain is not overwhelmed by too much sensory information.

Early research suggests we do, the researchers say.

The research has also allowed the scientists to explore how the learning of odours affects molecules that have been linked to autism and schizophrenia.

The researchers also hope to be able to use the key odorants to train honey bees to pollinate specific crops.

Using the honeybee's capacity to extract key odorants, scientists say they will be able to isolate these odorants from the complex aromas of crops.

"Farmers often have problems making honey bees focus on the crop - the bees go astray and go to nearby forests or national parks and the farmers don't get a good yield," researcher Dr Charles Claudianos said.

"If we know the key odorants of the almond aroma, for example, we could use these to train the honey bees in the hive to focus only on pollinating almonds.

"Then you'd have a much higher likelihood the honey bees would stay in the crop and pollinate it."

Separate research at QBI has determined how bees navigate, and that they can count to four.