NATURAL SCIENCES

Journal of fundamental
and
applied researches

THE OLFACTORY FUNCTION OF THE NASAL CAVITY OF THE HUMAN AT THE STAGES OF POSTNATAL ONTOGENESIS

2016. №3, pp. 43-51

Petrov Vladislav Vladimirovich - D.Sc. (Medicine), South-Russian Humanitarian Institute, 56a N. Ostrovskogo Str., Astrakhan, 414045, Russian Federation, glavlordmn@rambler.ru

The most important function of the nasal cavity of a human is sense of smell. The article discusses the specificity of age-related changes in olfactory function of the nasal cavity of a person in childhood, adolescence, youth and adulthood. Presents an analysis of the sense of smell in children (the period of analysis of odors and the formation of their differentiation), studied the perception of odors in adolescents (functional gains, gender differences, differences in threshold of perception and recognition of odors, the complexity of their differentiation and selectivity), assess the state of olfactory ability in young adulthood (the transition to a “functional plateau”) and in the mature period of ontogeny (definitive on the olfactory function). The juvenile stage of ontogenesis are presented as a critical period in the development of the olfactory abilities of the nasal cavity. In elderly and senile age there is the involution of the olfactory abilities of the nasal cavity, most pronounced in the elderly and centenarians, characterized by the development of different degrees of hyposmia and anosmia (the critical period оf function).

Key words: онтогенез, полость носа, обоняние, критические периоды, ольфактометрия, одориметрия, гипосмия, аносмия, одоранты, восприятие и распознавание запахов, ontogeny, nasal cavity, sense of smell, critical periods, olfactometria, odоrimetria, hyposmia, anosmi, о