So when these odorants
bind, they're going to cause a graded potential, which, when great
enough, or big enough can lead to an action potential.
And it's going to be which neurons are activated and how much they are
activated by binding a certain molecule that lets us convert that to a smell.
So if we have a certain molecule.
Let's say that there are two or three different odorant
neurons that combine different portions of that
odorant molecule, and so, which neurons are
activated and how much they're activated is
what we translate into smelling that molecule.
And so again it's very similar to our ability to see color where we don't have
a different receptor type and a different neuron
type for each color or for each molecule
we can smell.
But instead it's the matter of which neurons are activated and how much in
combination that allows us to detect so
many colors, and so many different or, odors.