Topic: compressed sensing

The mammalian olfactory system shows an exceptional ability for rapid and accurate decoding of both the identity and concentration of odorants. In a given scene, only a handful out of millions of possible odorants are present. Yet, the mammals can effectively distinguish these odorants using the dimensionally-reduced representation provided by olfactory receptor neurons. To account for this capability, normative compressed sensing models have been proposed by previous studies. However, these models do not map cleanly onto the unique anatomy and physiology of the olfactory bulb, nor have they d