Past research has shown that animals and insects navigate their way to these targets by sensing the intensity of odors and tracking back in the opposite direction of the wind.

However, following wind alone can lead them astray, for the same reason that smoke emanating from a chimney disperses and its trail does not always lead directly back to its source. A team of Yale scientists, led by Thierry Emonet and Damon Clark, wondered whether flies had a different trick between their two antennae: could they detect the motion of odor packets, independent of the wind?

— Read more in Flies smell the motion of odors and use it to navigate, Yale study finds at YaleNews.