Olfactory discrimination ability of human subjects for ten pairs of enantiomers
Olfactory discrimination ability of human subjects for ten pairs of enantiomers
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DOI：
10.1093/chemse/24.2.161
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发表时间：
1999-04-01
期刊：
影响因子：
3.5
通讯作者：
Teubner, P
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Laska, M;Teubner, P
我们测试了人类受试者区分对映异构体的能力，即除了手性之外相同的气味剂。在一个强制选择的三角测试程序中，20名受试者被反复呈现10种对映体气味对，并被要求识别含有奇怪刺激的瓶子。我们发现：（1）作为一个群体，受试者只能区分α-蒎烯、香芹酮和柠檬烯的光学异构体，而不能区分薄荷醇、茴香酮、玫瑰醚、樟脑、α-松油醇、β-香茅醇和2-丁醇的（+）-和（-）-形式;（ii）在辨别能力方面存在显著的个体差异，范围从能够显著区分10种气味中的6种的受试者到在10项任务中的9项任务中不能区分的受试者;（iii）当以相等浓度呈现时，10种气味对中没有一种被报道在主观强度上显著不同;以及（iv）错误率相当稳定，并且在会话之间没有显著差异，因此，我们观察到缺乏学习或训练效果。对α-蒎烯、香芹酮和柠檬烯的光学异构体的三重性程度和阈值测量的附加测试表明，这三种对映体气味对的可辨别性确实是由于气味质量的差异，这些发现支持了这样的假设，即对映选择性分子气味受体可能只存在于某些而不是所有的挥发性对映体中，因此气味物质的手性识别可能不是普遍的。这是一种现象，但仅限于某些物质。
We tested the ability of human subjects to distinguish between enantiomers, i.e. odorants which are identical except for chirality. In a forced-choice triangular test procedure 20 subjects were repeatedly presented with 10 enantiomeric odor pairs and asked to identify the bottle containing the odd stimulus. We found (i) that as a group, the subjects were only able to significantly discriminate the optical isomers of alpha-pinene, carvone and limonene, whereas they failed to distinguish between the (+)- and (-)-forms of menthol, fenchone, rose oxide, camphor, alpha-terpineol, beta-citroneliol and 2-butanol; (ii) marked individual differences in discrimination performance, ranging from subjects who were able to significantly discriminate between 6 of the 10 odor pairs to subjects who failed to do so with 9 of the 10 tasks; (iii) that with none of the 10 odor pairs were the antipodes reported to differ significantly in subjective intensity when presented at equal concentrations; and (iv) that error rates were quite stable and did not differ significantly between sessions, and thus, we observed a lack of learning or training effects. Additional tests of the degree of trigeminality and threshold measurements of the optical isomers of a-pinene, carvone and limonene suggest that the discriminability of these three enantiomeric odor pairs is indeed due to differences in odor quality, These findings support the assumption that enantioselective molecular odor receptors may only exist for some but not all volatile enantiomers and thus that chiral recognition of odorants may not be a general phenomenon but is restricted to some substances.