Big Pic: Mammalian Noses, Hot And Cold
Mammal Noses in Infrared Lund University Mammalian Rhinarium Group This collection of cute schnozzes illustrates an interesting fact: Some mammals have warm noses, while others maintain cooler ones. Can you guess which of the above noses belongs to which animal? The answers are at the bottom of this post. The images were made with an infrared camera, and the darkest parts represent 68 degrees Fahrenheit (20 degrees Celsius), while the lightest parts are a little more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The pictures come from scientists at Lund University in Sweden, who recently began studying a specialized mammalian nose structure called the rhinarium. “We want to know what mammals can do with specialized nose tips,” Lund zoologist Ronald Kröger tells Popular Science. Many mammals—including cows, deer and dogs, but not humans—have rhinaria, which, unlike human noses, are wet and hairless....