Our study was looking at how olfactory receptors and brain structures cope with mixtures and single odorants. At first, we thought that mixtures would mean complications but it turned out there was no extra complications and in fact, it's usually easier to smell mixtures than single odorants and the sensing is also slightly faster. This wasn't what we expected but this is what came out from our mathematical investigation.

— Thomas Nowotny of University of Sussex, quoted in Smelling the forest not the trees: Why animals are better at sniffing complex smells at Science Daily.