Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology (IFM)

In the wild mammalia prey species respond to the odors of natural predators through adaptive behaviours such as freezing, avoidance or change of orienttation respeonse. Through chemo-analytical studies a number of odorants have been identified that are characteristic of the urine, feaces or scent-gland secretion of mammalian predators. Behavioural studies have shown that different prey species respond accordingly to these odorants. This being said, very little is known about the olfactory sensiivity of different prey species for these predator odorant. 

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When it comes to primates there is a traditional view that they are "visual" animals with a poorly developed sense of smell. This view have in recent years been questioned as several behavioral observations hve stated the opposite. Today there is evence from a number of primate species that this is not the case and that primates do use their sense of smell in areas involving food selection, social behaviours, territorial defense and predator avoidance.

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As new testing methods are developed it is now possible to test the sensitvity of different primate species sense of smell. Previous studies on spider monkeys (Ateles geoffroyi) have shown that they are rapid learners for new odorants and have a long-term odor memory.

Aim: 

Determine the olfactory detection threshold of female spider monkeys for six different predator odors.