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Animals
Special Issues
Canine Olfaction
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Canine Olfaction

A special issue of Animals (ISSN 2076-2615). This special issue belongs to the section "Companion Animals".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 September 2026 | Viewed by 2204

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Irene Ortiz-Leal

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Anatomy, Animal Production and Clinical Veterinary Sciences, Faculty of Veterinary, University of Santiago de Compostela, Av. Carballo Calero s/n, 27002 Lugo, Spain
Interests: canids; dog; olfactory system; neuroanatomy
Prof. Dr. Pablo Sánchez Quinteiro

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Anatomy, Animal Production and Clinical Veterinary Sciences, Faculty of Veterinary, University of Santiago de Compostela, Av. Carballo Calero s/n, 27002 Lugo, Spain
Interests: animal anatomy; neuroscience; histology; immunohistochemistry; olfactory system
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue is dedicated to the diverse and fascinating topic of Canine Olfaction. Dogs possess one of the most powerful olfactory systems among terrestrial mammals, and their sense of smell plays a critical role in how they perceive and interact with the world. Nevertheless, despite substantial progress, numerous questions remain unresolved at the morphological, functional, clinical, and molecular levels, limiting the full exploitation of the remarkable potential this system offers from both applied and translational perspectives. This Special Issue welcomes original manuscripts that explore the anatomy, physiology, and functional aspects of the canine olfactory system. Topics of interest include but are not limited to olfactory receptor biology, nasal airflow dynamics, olfactory learning and memory, and scent discrimination capabilities.

Given the extensive use of detection dogs in various applied fields, such as medical diagnosis, law enforcement, wildlife conservation, agriculture, and search-and-rescue—research examining training methods, scent detection performance, environmental influences, and handler–dog interactions is particularly encouraged. We also invite studies that assess the effects of breed differences, age, health, and working conditions on olfactory efficiency.

By gathering a range of scientific contributions on canine olfaction, this Special Issue aims to advance our understanding of the underlying mechanisms and practical applications of this remarkable sensory modality.

Dr. Irene Ortiz-Leal
Prof. Dr. Pablo Sánchez Quinteiro
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Animals is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • canine olfaction
  • scent detection
  • vomeronasal system
  • odor discrimination
  • sniffer dogs
  • pheromones

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

15 pages, 1326 KB  
Article
From Control to Clue: Integrating Olfaction into the Object-Choice Task for Domestic Dogs (Canis familiaris)
by Sylvie Bergquist and Alexandra Horowitz
Animals 2026, 16(9), 1324; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani16091324 - 26 Apr 2026
Viewed by 675
Abstract
Humans rely heavily on vision for information-gathering, decision-making, and communication, making it difficult to imagine how our perception of the world might change if our primary sensory modality were entirely different. Dogs (Canis familiaris), for instance, rely as much or more [...] Read more.
Humans rely heavily on vision for information-gathering, decision-making, and communication, making it difficult to imagine how our perception of the world might change if our primary sensory modality were entirely different. Dogs (Canis familiaris), for instance, rely as much or more on olfaction as on vision in information-gathering. Nonetheless, canine cognition research has largely emphasized visual tasks. In the present study (N = 48 dogs) we aim to begin to remedy this by designing an olfactory version of a prototypical dog-cognition experimental design: the object choice test. In the standard design, subjects respond to an experimenter’s pointing gesture to choose between two overturned cups, one of which is baited with a food treat. We extended this paradigm by adding trials using an “olfactory point” in place of the visual gesture. In these trials, two cotton strings extended from the cups toward the subject and converged in front of the subject. The string leading to the baited cup was scented with either the odor of the treat or the subject’s owner, while the string leading to the non-baited cup remained unscented as a control. Subjects followed both visual and olfactory points at rates significantly above chance. These findings suggest that dogs can use experimentally presented olfactory cues to guide choice behavior, supporting the development of experimental designs that better reflect species-specific sensory systems. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Canine Olfaction)
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16 pages, 927 KB  
Article
Trained Scent Dog Detection and GC-MS Analysis of Volatile Organic Compounds from Murine Coronavirus-Infected Cell Cultures
by Agata Kokocińska-Alexandre, Martyna Woszczyło, Michał Dzięcioł, Agata Kublicka, Adam Szumowski, Jacek Łyczko, Katarzyna Barłowska, Antoni Szumny, Marcin J. Skwark and Anna Karolina Matczuk
Animals 2026, 16(4), 647; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani16040647 - 18 Feb 2026
Viewed by 754
Abstract
Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are increasingly recognized as metabolic byproducts of viral infection and may serve as olfactory cues detectable by trained scent dogs. This study examined whether dogs could distinguish cell culture samples infected with murine hepatitis virus strain 1 (MHV-1), a [...] Read more.
Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are increasingly recognized as metabolic byproducts of viral infection and may serve as olfactory cues detectable by trained scent dogs. This study examined whether dogs could distinguish cell culture samples infected with murine hepatitis virus strain 1 (MHV-1), a biosafety level 2 coronavirus model, from uninfected controls. Parallel chemical analysis using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) identified 14 VOCs in infected and 12 in control samples. Notably, 3-heptanone and 1-nonanol were unique to infected samples, while others such as acetophenone, nonanal, decanal, and benzaldehyde were significantly elevated—often by 1.5 to 3 times—in infected cultures. Two trained dogs demonstrated high detection sensitivity (0.95) for infected samples compared to a previously trained odor cinnamon group (0.88) and responded with shorter latency (p = 0.04), suggesting perceptual salience of infection-related VOCs. Reliable detection required pooled volumes (~600 µL), suggesting a threshold effect related to VOC concentration. Additionally, a Random Forest-based machine learning classifier trained on the GC-MS-obtained VOC profiles achieved a cross-validated accuracy of 0.82 (SD = 0.25). These findings suggest that dogs use quantitative VOC differences, rather than unique compounds, for detection. The study provides a validated experimental framework for olfactory diagnostics of viral infections and highlights the potential of scent dogs as non-invasive biosensors in both veterinary and public health contexts. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Canine Olfaction)
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