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托福阅读资料下载 新托福阅读材料： Timingiseverythingforsharksthatsmellinstereo To follow the scent trail left by their prey across the ocean, sharks swim in the direction of the nostril that sniffed the odor first, scientists have found. Their research challenges the classic notion that sharks orient themselves based on the differences between odor concentration received at each nostril. Shark prey--whether living, injured or dead--leaves behind swirling odor plumes that break apart with distance. The latest work, published online June 10 in Current Biology, suggests that when a shark moves into a patch of odor, the smell hits one nostril before the other--and that tells the shark to turn either left or right. By moving from side to side from one patch to another, the animal maintains contact with the odor plume as it tracks its prey, says Jayne Gardiner at the University of South Florida in Tampa, co-author of the study. Ocean odors mix chaotically, so for sharks to steer using odor concentration, they would need to compare the average concentration at the two nostrils over a period of several minutes to determine the preyapos;s direction. They would then have to reposition themselves and start again--a slow process. But by using timing cues, says Gardiner, sharks receive directionality in under a second. Squid marinade The study centered around lab studies of eight smooth dogfish （Mustelus canis）， a small gray-brown shark. To recreate prey odor, Gardiner marinated squid--what she calls junk food for dogfish--in 50 liters of seawater. She fitted the sharks with headgear consisting of two tubes delivering this squid marinade to one nostril and then the other. She found that for delays between 0.1 and 0.5 seconds, the sharks turned toward the side receiving the first stimulus. If there was no time lag or if the lag was a second or longer, the sharks were equally likely to