Chemical Signals in Vertebrates

Chemical cues and signals, usually in the form of odours, play a significant role in the lives of domestic and wild animals. Odours may attract or repel and thus influence feeding and mating behaviour, detection of predators and prey, social and spatial structure within groups, and the defence of territories. We are continually refining our understanding of these phenomena and finding ever more complex relationships among the chemical properties of odour-producing substances, the physiological mechanisms of olfactory detection, and the behavioural responses of different kinds of vertebrates, and of the two sexes under varying conditions. The fifth in a series on this subject, this book arises out of a conference held every two years. It reviews recent work in this field and presents the results of the latest research.