This research plan specifically addresses three fundamental questions: (1) How do odors trigger approach or avoidance behaviors through the olfactory striatum? (2) How does dopamine shape olfactory processing in the olfactory striatum according to external context and internal needs? (3) How does the olfactory striatum signal the novelty and saliency of an odor to generate an orienting response? Through these questions, our work will finally distill the cell-type specific operations that flexibly and rapidly assign the appropriate behavioral response to a sensory stimulus. This project will leverage the evolutionary conserved anatomy of the olfactory system and the immediate relevance that odors have in our emotional experience of the world. Such framework privileges the search for simple and robust algorithms and therefore our results promise to indicate solutions for multiple types of neurobiological problems. In addition, our model let one compare innate and trained behaviors to investigate how experience individualizes stereotypic sensory-motor transformations. Apart from its intellectual implications, such depth of understanding will nucleate more selective strategies for therapeutic intervention in psychiatric diseases.