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Mysterious Molecules
Possible Gene For Pheromone Detectors in People Found
By Joseph B. Verrengia
The Associated Press
Aug. 28 — Scientists have identified the first human gene that may be linked to pheromones, odorless molecules that in other animals trigger primal urges, including sex, defense and kinship.
Experts describe the discovery as possibly opening a new door into the role of pheromones in human development.
In animals, researchers have documented how pheromones trace complex neurological paths to stimulate parts of the brain that are deeply rooted in instinct.
Researchers have long believed that humans also communicate through pheromones, but until now they had been unable to find any of the equipment needed to detect these potent molecules.
Nose Holds Detector
Now, in experiments at Rockefeller University and Yale, neurogeneticists have isolated a human gene, labeled V1RL1, that they believe encodes for a pheromone receptor in the mucous lining of the nose. A receptor is a patch on the surface of a cell that binds with specific molecules, like a lock that accepts only a specific key.
"This is the first convincing identification of a human pheromone receptor," said University of Colorado biochemist Joseph Falke.
Humans share the V1RL1 gene with rodents and other mammals that rely heavily on pheromone cues to survive.
However, it has not been determined whether the gene is active in humans or which pheromone-induced behavior the gene might induce.
"The ultimate test will be to find a pheromone that binds to the receptor and triggers a measurable physiological response," Falke said.
The research was published in the September issue of the journal Nature Genetics.
Researchers took samples from a gene bank and scanned them for matches to the rodent genes from the V1r family. They found eight matches in human genetic material.
Further testing showed that seven of the eight human V1r genes are inoperative. The potentially functional gene, called V1RL1, subsequently was found in 11 out of 11 randomly chosen people from varying ethnic backgrounds, researchers said.
Reactionary Signal
While rodents and other creatures essentially are reactive animals that depend heavily on pheromones for behavioral cues, humans use their larger brains to rely more on judgment and complex sensory cues, such as vision.
"In mice, we think there are more than 100 functioning genes in the V1r family," said Ivan Rodriguez of Rockefeller University, lead author of the study. "But in humans, V1RL1 may very well be the sole functioning gene in the family."
"Why has it hung around all this time?" said Charles Wysocki of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia. "It must be very important if it has outlived all of its predecessors."
Scientists aren’t sure what happened to the other 99 genes.
"It’s unheard of that a family of 100 genes in mice is reduced to a single gene in humans," said the study’s senior author, Peter Mombaerts.
In most mammals, pheromones usually are detected by a specialized organ inside the nose or mouth called the vomeronasal organ, or VNO. Nerves connect it to parts of the brain involved in reactions rather than cognition.
In humans, the organ appears in embryos with its nerve cells extending into the developing brain. For several weeks, it serves as a pathway for hormones vital to sexual development and maturity. However, the VNO in humans shrinks and stops working before birth.
To What Effect?
Researchers have long suspected that humans communicate with pheromones. But how pheromones are produced and how they are detected across a room, or even greater distances, is poorly understood.
One 1998 study at the University of Chicago demonstrated that pheromones in underarm sweat prompt women living in close quarters to synchronize their menstrual cycles.
Mombaerts said it is too early to tell whether the gene discovery might lead to pheromone-based medicines.
However, the potential for pheromone misuse worries some researchers and bioethicists.
"Safeguards will be needed to prevent the manipulation of human behavior," Falke said. "We won’t want pheromones showing up in magazine ads, or pumped through ventilation systems at the mall." Just more scientific proof of the power of human pheromones.
March 11, 1998
(CNN) -- The power of smell is undeniable, as the multi-billion dollar perfume industry testifies. But is it possible that humans are influenced by airborne chemicals undetectable as odors, called pheromones?
Though any number of animals and insects use pheromones to communicate with each other about important things such as food, territory and sex, the idea that humans might be similarly influenced has been controversial among scientists.
But now, researchers at the University of Chicago say they have the first proof that humans produce and react to pheromones.
In findings published in the journal Nature, researchers say they found that female ovulation can be regulated -- made longer or shorter -- through the use of pheromones.
"The pheromones regulate the time of ovulation. There are two pheromones -- one that makes ovulation more likely and the other that suppresses it and makes it less likely," said Martha McClintock of the University of Chicago.
There could be important practical implications from this finding. Because pheromones influence the release of eggs, researchers say they may provide a more natural way of preventing pregnancy or treating infertility.
One enduring mystery of pheromones is that if they are undetectable by the human sense of smell, how can humans be influenced by them?
The answer, some researchers believe, is that pheromones are detected by the same nerve cells in the nose used to detect odor or perhaps by another structure in the nose called the vomeronasal organ.
Medical Correspondent Rhonda Rowland contributed to this report.
Just more scientific proof of the power of human pheromones.
Following Our Noses
Other animals can communicate volumes through smell. Now it appears we can too
By JEFFREY KLUGER
f you're an animal, there are few things as valuable as a good nose. In a world without speech, it's often scent alone that tells you if a stranger is in the mood to mate or in distress, is preparing to attack or about to retreat in fear. The chemicals that carry these odorless messages are called pheromones, and while most animals produce them, the highest animals--humans--were thought to be above such crude olfactory signals.
Last week all that changed. In a paper published in the journal Nature, psychologist Martha McClintock of the University of Chicago reported what may be the best evidence yet of human pheromones. In an elegantly straightforward experiment, she was able to speed up and slow down the monthly cycles of a group of women by exposing them to a whiff of sweat from other women. The ovulatory command, she believes, was carried by pheromones.
If McClintock is right, the implications could be sweeping, offering not just new insights into human communication but practical medical applications as well. "Once you establish that pheromones exist," McClintock says, "the question becomes how far-ranging they can be."
For most scientists, pheromones are nothing new. In the 1930s entomologists first noticed that female moths are able to excite males even when the males can neither see nor hear them. The males, they discovered, "smell" the females, grabbing their fragrance out of the air with exquisitely sensitive antennae. Once that fragrance was isolated, it was found to be powerful indeed, able to stimulate millions of moths with concentrations of less than one 300-millionth of an ounce.
When substances this potent hit the sensory systems of a relatively unsophisticated animal, they pack a big behavioral wallop. Pheromones emitted by queen bees prevent other females from maturing sexually, ensuring that the queen's genes remain dominant. Among fish, scent markers released by females cause male sperm counts to quintuple overnight. When injured by a predator, some amphibians emit a compound that warns others of their species to keep out of harm's way.
It is in mammals that the pheromonal chatter climaxes. Countless species--from wolves to musk ox--claim territory by urinating around their borders, an olfactory keep-off-the-grass sign if there ever was one. Male voles use urine as a potent aphrodisiac, excreting a chemical that causes females to ovulate within 48 hours. "Identify anything that's of biological significance to animals," says Rachel Herz of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, "and it's usually mediated by scent."
Uncovering similar tendencies in humans wasn't easy; McClintock began looking nearly 30 years ago. As an undergraduate at Wellesley College, she noticed that the women in her dormitory often developed remarkably similar menstrual patterns. In other animals, this kind of synchrony has survival advantages. "When you see others successfully rearing young," McClintock says, "it means it's a good time for you too."
The phenomenon intrigued McClintock, and she and co-researcher Kathleen Stern recently revisited it, hoping not just to observe ovulation but manipulate it. They recruited a group of 29 women and asked nine of them to wear pads under their arms for several hours, either before ovulation or just after. When the pads were wiped under the noses of the other women, the results were remarkable. Pre-ovulation pads shortened menstrual cycles by as many as 14 days in 68% of the women. When exposed to ovulation-phase pads, a different 68% experienced cycles that were as many as 12 days longer. Clearly, something was bringing the group into synch.
Among other scientists, the reaction to the study has been mostly positive--but questions remain. Even if human pheromones exist, it's not clear how the body processes them. Mammals and reptiles detect pheromones with a tiny nasal cavity called a vomeronasal organ, or VNO. Anatomists don't think humans have a VNO and aren't sure we would need one to perceive pheromones. Though a few researchers think they've found telltale pits just inside the nostrils, these may do nothing at all.
McClintock, meanwhile, is pushing ahead. Pheromone treatments designed to regulate ovulation, she says, could serve as fertility enhancers for couples who want to conceive and as contraceptives for those who don't. Other researchers think mood-altering pheromones could alleviate depression and stress. Still others think the chemicals might even control prostate activity in men, reducing the risk of cancer. New insights into how the body works, it seems, aren't right under our noses, but inside them.
Just more scientific proof of the power of human pheromones.
--Reported by David Bjerklie /New York
June 25, 1999
Web posted at: 9:00 AM EDT (1300 GMT)
By Deb Levine, M.A.
(WebMD) -- You've never heard of pheromones? Well, it's time to learn about the part they play in your sex life, because it could be substantial. The concept of a human pheromone, or sexual scent of attraction, has been debated and researched for years.
In most animals, the relationship between pheromones and mating is straightforward. Sea urchins, for example, release pheromones into the surrounding water, sending a chemical message that triggers other urchins in the colony to eject their sex cells simultaneously.
Human pheromones, on the other hand, are highly individualized, and not always noticeable. In 1986 Dr. Winifred Cutler, a biologist and behavioral endocrinologist, codiscovered pheromones in our underarms. She and her team of researchers found that once any overbearing underarm sweat was removed, what remained were the odorless materials containing the pheromones.
Dr. Cutler's original studies in the '70s showed that women who have regular sex with men have more regular menstrual cycles than women who have sporadic sex. Regular sex delayed the decline of estrogen and made women more fertile. This led the research team to look for what the man was providing in the equation. By 1986 they realized it was pheromones.
Menstrual synchronization
There's more on how pheromones affect women's menstrual cycles. Think back to college, or to growing up if you had sisters. Most women who live with or near other women adjust their menstrual cycle timing to each other. A recent study at the University of Chicago by Martha McClintock exposed a group of women to a whiff of perspiration from other women. It caused their menstrual cycles to speed up or slow down depending on the time in the month the sweat was collected -- before, during or after ovulation. This was the first proof that people produce and respond to pheromones.
Although it's now clear that pheromones exist, the way our body processes them has yet to be determined. Animals have a vomeronasal organ (VNO), which perceives the substance and then leads them to mate. Some anatomists don't think humans have a VNO; others think they've found pits inside our nostrils that might be VNOs, but may not work.
Implications for fertility and depression
Despite the gap in our knowledge, these remarkable studies about pheromones and menstrual cycles have brought to light the idea that pheromones could be used as fertility treatments for couples who want to conceive, or as contraceptives for those who don't. And couples who are having sexual problems could use pheromones combined with traditional therapy to enhance desire. It's also possible, some researchers say, that pheromones could be a mood enhancer, alleviating depression and stress. And the most far-reaching hypothesis so far is that pheromone treatment could control prostate activity in men to reduce the risk of cancer.
Subtle but strong influence
If you're looking for the man or woman of your dreams, unsuspecting pheromones in your body scent are most likely playing a large and very clever role in mate attraction. According to an article in "Psychology Today," how our body odors are perceived as pleasant and sexy to another person is a highly selective process. We usually smell best to a person whose genetically based immunity to disease differs most from our own. This could benefit you in the long run, making for stronger, healthier children.
Seventy-four percent of the people who tested a commercial pheromone called Athena, developed by Dr. Cutler, experienced an increase in hugging, kissing and sexual intercourse. Maybe the best advice to those looking for a mate or wanting to take their relationship to a new level is to take a good long sniff!
Just more scientific proof of the power of human pheromones.
Copyright 1999 by WebMD, Inc. All rights reserved
