UA senior scholar awarded for olfactory studies

Adam F. Jarrold Arizona Daily Wildcat The Manduca sexta, or giant sphnix moth as observed in its three life stages: larval (caterpillar), pupa and moth.

The award, given every three years to a leading senior scholar "for innovative research in Chemosensory sciences," is sponsored by International Flavors and Fragrances, Inc. Hildebrand was presented the award at the International Symposium on Olfaction and Taste in July.

The award came with a plaque and a $5,000 cash prize. Hildebrand said he used some of the cash to get to San Diego to accept the award and put the remainder back into the study.

Hildebrand, who calls the IFF award "the old man or woman award" because it is given to a researcher based on a culmination of years of work, said the award does not have the "global impact" of something like the Nobel Prize, but that it's a great award for his field.

"It's a way to call attention to this area of science," he said of the neurosciences, and more specifically, olfaction, which is an animal's sense of smell.

"Cancer research, people always hear about. Heart research is very publicized, but we're not, so this is very special," he said.

Hildebrand came to Arizona in 1985 after spending time on staff at Harvard Medical School and Columbia University in neurosciences. He said he decided to come to the University of Arizona because the administration made a "serious" commitment to employ both him and his wife, Vickie, who is an office specialist for Extended University.

"They gave both of us some good opportunities here," he said. "When they decided to start the ARL division, they wanted me to be director. You have to make some hard decisions in life, but this was something I couldn't pass up."

Most of the work done in Hildebrand's lab is on the Manduca sexta, a giant sphinx moth. He said this moth is a good model for research because it's olfactory system is "incredibly similar" in organization to that of a human's, but that in other ways it is much simpler, which makes it easy to study.

Doing such intensive research on the nose of a moth may seem like "the weirdest thing," Hildebrand said, but the information gained can be applied in many areas.

A company like IFF, which specializes in figuring out what kinds of scents attract humans to certain types of foods, drinks, perfumes and many other things, will pay a lot of money for the knowledge developed through the working on a moth's sense of smell, he said.

Hildebrand also said the studies he and his co-workers perform have a big impact on the agriculture industry.

"The most important agricultural pests in the world are also moths," Hildebrand said. "So it also teaches us about insect olfaction and the way they find their host plant and the way they reproduce."

The sense of smell in certain types of moths, he said, is also closely related to the olfaction of mosquitoes. If researchers can find out more about why certain mosquitoes pick certain hosts, such as a mammal rather than a reptile, they will be able to "break the link," Hildebrand said. This information could theoretically lead to stopping the spread of diseases such as malaria, thought to be spread by mosquitoes.

The biggest thrill in his field of work, he said, is that nobody knows where the next bit of information will come from that makes a difference on a global scale.

"The reason we're here is because we're people who never thought it was uncool to be excited and interested - We're basically little kids in big bodies.

"This unit is the only one like it in the world," Hildebrand said. "The nice thing about this award is that it is a validation of the work I and my co-workers have done over our careers. They're saying 'What you do is a very significant chunk of knowledge in our field today.'"