AVIAN OLFACTORY NEUROGENESIS

Chemodetection represents one of the more primitive ways in which anim als acquire information about their environment. Olfaction, an elabora te form of chemodetection, is common to every species of vertebrae. Th e mechanisms of olfaction have been particularly studied in rodents, a lthough their olfactory organ, the olfactory epithelium, paradoxically presents the highest degree of complexity. For some years now, we hav e been interested in the avian olfactory system which is less complex than its mammalian counterpart. Like humans, birds are microsmatic and present the same basic characteristics as other air breathing species . In this review, we propose to discuss several aspects of the maturat ion of the olfactory system during development, paying particular atte ntion to recent advances in this field.