Sea Monster debuts at zoo - Monessen Valley Independent

octobot

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Sea Monster debuts at zoo
[SIZE=-1]Monessen Valley Independent[/SIZE]
[SIZE=-1]The 10-month-old Great Pacific octopus came to the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium in June but just made her public debut in the facility's 1300-gallon tank. She was caught in a fisherman's net off the coast of Oregon and rescued by biologists at the ...[/SIZE]

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Looks great. I was curious though. The article quotes Zellar as saying that the octopus recognizes people by how they smell. The cuttlefish I look after seem to be able to recognize faces as far as I can tell but I wasn't aware cephalopods had any particularly powerful olfactory sense. That must be if they stick their arms in the water right? Very interesting, more to read up on.
 
There have been studies that show octopuses can chemically detect "odor" in the water. It was my understanding detection was through the suckers but in trying to refererence on of the studies I found this abstract that mentions olfactory pits (discovered in a 1997 study by Budelmann, Schipp & Boletzky) so I want to look further to see where they are :biggrin2:. To confirm the answer you question though, detection is in the water, not in the air.

-edit
From what I found in addition to the chemical receptors on the suckers there are olfactory receptors on either side of the head and pits in nautilus. I could not locate a diagram showing the position of the "nose" (I was hoping it would define my mysterious white marks on the mantle but the one description of location I found stated head).
 

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