PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Saraiva, Luis R. AU - Riveros-McKay, Fernando AU - Mezzavilla, Massimo AU - Abou-Moussa, Eman H. AU - Arayata, Charles J. AU - Makhlouf, Melanie AU - Trimmer, Casey AU - Ibarra-Soria, Ximena AU - Khan, Mona AU - Van Gerven, Laura AU - Jorissen, Mark AU - Gibbs, Matthew AU - O’Flynn, Ciaran AU - McGrane, Scott AU - Mombaerts, Peter AU - Marioni, John C. AU - Mainland, Joel D. AU - Logan, Darren W. TI - A transcriptomic atlas of mammalian olfactory mucosae reveals an evolutionary influence on food odor detection in humans AID - 10.1126/sciadv.aax0396 DP - 2019 Jul 01 TA - Science Advances PG - eaax0396 VI - 5 IP - 7 4099 - 4100 - SO - Sci Adv2019 Jul 01; 5 AB - The mammalian olfactory system displays species-specific adaptations to different ecological niches. To investigate the evolutionary dynamics of olfactory sensory neuron (OSN) subtypes across mammalian evolution, we applied RNA sequencing of whole olfactory mucosa samples from mouse, rat, dog, marmoset, macaque, and human. We find that OSN subtypes, representative of all known mouse chemosensory receptor gene families, are present in all analyzed species. Further, we show that OSN subtypes expressing canonical olfactory receptors are distributed across a large dynamic range and that homologous subtypes can be either highly abundant across all species or species/order specific. Highly abundant mouse and human OSN subtypes detect odorants with similar sensory profiles and sense ecologically relevant odorants, such as mouse semiochemicals or human key food odorants. Together, our results allow for a better understanding of the evolution of mammalian olfaction in mammals and provide insights into the possible functions of highly abundant OSN subtypes.