Closer to Revealing My True Self-Chapter 285 - 211 Smell_1

Jia scratched his head, "To declare a territory... it’s generally done through physical or chemical signals, right? Physical signals would be things like scratch marks or bite marks, while chemical signals involve emitting scent information in various ways. Both methods are similar to humans setting up boundary markers or warning signs."

Isn’t that all there is to declaring a territory?

Be it physical or chemical signals, if marking doesn’t work, you fight. If one fight isn’t enough, you fight several times, and if that still doesn’t work, you fight to the death.

What puzzled Jia was why Feng Yi would be interested in such things?

After briefly explaining, Jia observed Feng Yi’s reaction.

Feng Yi’s expression was unreadable, but he was definitely listening, though it was unclear what he was thinking.

After waiting a while, Feng Yi told Jia to rest while he continued to watch the documentary, then went to bed after washing up, pondering the methods of declaring territory.

Instinct told him that his ancestral DNA contained relevant information, but the specifics of how to execute it could only be determined by trial and error.

Perhaps he thought too much before bed, as Feng Yi had many jumbled dreams that night, but upon waking, could not recall any of them.

Before leaving the house in the morning, Feng Yi asked Jia to prepare for a yacht trip out to sea that evening—he had something to take care of.

Jia, without asking too many questions, responded with excitement. All he had to do was execute the orders; he would do as the boss said.

Though unsure what Feng Yi was preparing for, it didn’t matter to Jia—he finally had a chance to prove his worth!

Where to sail from, what time slot, and in which direction—he had it all figured out in his mind and would confirm the details later.

Speaking of fishing...

Fishing? What fishing!

Is fishing anywhere near as exciting as going out to sea with the boss?

If he could be involved in the boss’s affairs, that would be even better!

Jia burst out the door with excitement.

Feng Yi, just like the previous days, went out to sea with the survey team after breakfast. However, today’s task was only half a day, returning by noon for a few important meetings with the big shots. For these meetings, non-core members like Feng Yi were not required to attend.

With nothing else to do and many questions in his heart, Feng Yi couldn’t stay put in his dormitory; he took a nap and prepared to head out.

He changed out of his work clothes into a simple sweatshirt with sunglasses hanging at the neckline.

Ever since he was recognized on the street after his first outing for food, Feng Yi made it a point not to wear work clothes when he went out for leisure.

At the north gate of the dormitory area, Feng Yi saw Professor Ding returning from outside.

The big black dog guarding the north gate seemed to have grown familiar with Professor Ding, wagging its tail and approaching happily.

Professor Ding stroked the dog while chatting with Old Liu in the guardhouse and waved a greeting to Feng Yi.

Feng Yi approached and asked, "The meeting ended so soon?"

Professor Ding waved his hand, "I’ve already given them the data and analysis report. I’m not always with the local survey team anyway; we have our own tasks. Let them decide on their own matters."

Then he asked Feng Yi, "How did it go with the courseware yesterday? Any questions?"

Feng Yi, who had thought about "declaring territory" all night without actually looking at the courseware, replied, "... Yes."

Professor Ding became interested, "Tell me, I have time right now."

Feng Yi: "It’s not about the courseware. It’s something I thought of while looking at other materials. Can different species really communicate information through chemical substances?"

Professor Ding answered without hesitation: "Of course they can!"

Without a moment’s doubt.

Professor Ding: "In the food chain of an ecological system, each trophic level, through a long process of co-evolution in the natural world, has formed a complex interrelationship. The chemical substances released by plants or animals play a significant role in information communication and form an extremely complex information network. Many people are interested in this kind of chemical information communication, but so far, what we understand is only scratching the surface."

Considering that Feng Yi was not a professional in theoretical knowledge, Professor Ding’s words shifted, "Speaking of which, we can’t help but mention olfaction. For instance, if you are sensitive to a certain substance, when you smell it, the related olfactory receptors on your olfactory organs get activated, creating a specific olfactory sensory pathway. You know about ’olfactory receptors,’ right? They are special proteins that can bind with odor molecules, responsible for transmitting the scent signals to the brain."

Feng Yi nodded: "Yes, I know."

"Generally, we believe that the more ’olfactory receptor’ genes one has, the stronger the sense of smell. Different species have varying abilities to sense smell; humans have about 400 types, which is average."

Professor Ding had no other pressuring matters at hand and wasn’t in a hurry to do anything, so he sat on the edge of a flowerbed.

"Like this dog, for instance, dogs have a much stronger sense of smell than humans..."

Professor Ding beckoned to the black dog.

The black dog approached wagging its tail, and then its protruding snout was grabbed.

Dogs have a wider range of facial expressions than wolves, especially in the muscles where their eyebrows would be—anxious twitching combined with the hesitantly wagging tail straightforwardly showcased its inner thoughts at the moment.

However, Professor Ding was not paying attention to its sentiments just then.

"When it smells something, part of the air goes to the respiratory system, and another part..."

Professor Ding’s fingertips traced along the central axis above the dog’s nose, moving towards the space between its eyes, and tapped gently:

"...goes towards the olfactory recess. Odor molecules complete the olfactory detection in this special structure. They can accurately identify certain scents in complex environments and even clearly know which scents are perceived by which nostril."

After releasing the big black dog’s long snout, Professor Ding looked up and saw a bird flash across the sky:

"Take that bird, for example. In people’s common belief, aside from a few birds like vultures that hunt through smell, most other birds have almost no sense of smell. But their genes tell us otherwise. Through genome sequencing, we can find that many birds have olfactory receptor genes, few around 100, many over 600.

"Research into evolutionary trees can reveal that bird ancestors likely possessed a very diverse array of olfactory receptor genes, which enabled them to distinguish some critical olfactory information. There is a lot of chemical information they are not sensitive to, but what they are sensitive to, we know little about, or not at all."

Professor Ding looked at Feng Yi: "If you want to study the chemical communication between species, you can’t think from a human perspective. Their olfactory world is different from ours, you can’t imagine what kind of world they perceive."

Feng Yi, experiencing a different world, said, "...You’re right."

Thinking of something, Professor Ding laughed again: "No, no, no, what I just said was wrong, too absolute. Even among humans, you are different from us!"

Feng Yi’s heart skipped a beat, but his expression did not change, his face remained calm: "How am I different?"

Professor Ding: "For example, you, sensitive to the smell of snakes, can smell what we cannot. Your olfactory genes might be more numerous than most of us. Indeed, there are a small number of people, to be precise, a very few, who have highly sensitive olfaction. You are lucky to be one of them."

Feng Yi took a deep breath without showing a trace and said, "Individuals do have differences."

"Right, that’s it. But regardless, we humans cannot compare with those species that have strong olfactory abilities," Professor Ding sighed slightly. "I now hope that electronic noses can be upgraded quickly. Maybe one day, with the help of an instrument, I can know what kind of world the species with a gift for smelling see. You’re looking forward to that too, aren’t you?"

Feng Yi: "...Hmm."

Professor Ding teased, "The olfactory receptors of humans are unreliable, with too many thoughts, and they might not all be in your nose—they could be in some strange places too!"

Feng Yi asked curiously, "Like where?"

Professor Ding: "Like hair follicles. If they smell some ’correct’ odors, they will be uniquely activated. Although it won’t tell you what the smell is, it can prevent hair loss from follicle degradation, or in other words—prevent balding!"

Not far away, a young worker with eyes shining couldn’t help saying, "Then, where can one buy such ’correct’ smells?"

Professor Ding touched his slightly balding head, "Ah, I’d like to know that too."

With no further questions, Feng Yi watched Professor Ding start discussing how to elegantly prevent hair loss with the man.

Feng Yi didn’t have this kind of trouble at the moment, so he didn’t join in their discussion.

Walking onto the street, Feng Yi put on the hoodie’s hood, donned sunglasses, grabbed a shared bicycle, and arrived at a small park near the sea.

Jia had said that not many tourists come to this spot, and at this time, it wasn’t a peak period for visitors.

The weather was nice today, with a sea breeze blowing.

There were not many people here at the moment, but it wasn’t deserted; there were also sparrows chirping on the trees.

The sparrows here were bold. It was clear that both tourists and locals were friendly to them; they often gathered in groups, actively or passively getting some food from people’s hands.

Having probably eaten their fill, the sparrows were now very lively, hopping around on the tree branches.

A few looked at Feng Yi, then, disinterested, turned away. Even as Feng Yi approached, they only flapped their wings perfunctorily and continued to ignore him.

Feng Yi gauged the wind direction and, facing those sparrows in the tree, raised his hand.

The pupils behind his sunglasses gradually became vertical slits.

Chemical substances invisible and odorless to ordinary people began to emanate from the palms of his hands, drifting towards the flock of sparrows.

To creatures that were not sensitive to this chemical signal, nothing was noticed, but those that were sensitive reacted differently.

The sparrows behaved as if they had seen a ferocious, fanged maw charging at them! freeweɓnovel.cѳm

The previously distracted sparrows suddenly took off in panic, screeching as they scattered.

A single sparrow wouldn’t cause much commotion, but a flock of sparrows suddenly flying off like refugees inevitably drew the attention of the nearby people.

Spread out here and there, people looked towards that corner and saw nothing but a person wearing a hoodie basking in the sun; nothing else was particularly noticeable.

The seaside wind dispersed the chemical substances in the air.

Everything was as lovely as before.

"Could it be a stray cat came to catch the sparrows again?" an old lady said.

"Perhaps not, sparrows are always so jumpy."

"No, the sparrows here are very bold!"

"No worries, they’ll come back again soon."

However, until the sun set, the flock of sparrows that had flown off didn’t return to that tree. They only hopped around in the branches of other trees in the park, but that corner remained untouched by any sparrow.