The elephant’s trunk is far more than a long, flexible snout. It is a complex fusion of the nose and upper lip, packed with muscles, nerves, and sensory cells. Scientists have discovered that elephants have an astonishing number of olfactory receptor genes—around 2,000 types—making theirs the largest repertoire of any species studied so far. By comparison, dogs, which are considered masters of scent detection, have about 800 to 1,000 receptor types, and humans only around 400.

— Read more in Elephants’ Incredible Sense of Smell: How They Detect Water from Miles Away at Vocal.