Madeleine, a Smell Camera: Capture the Scents you Want with High Technology

Wouldn't it be wonderful to have had the smell of your beloved's hair captured into more than a curl-containing locket dangling from your neck? What about your dearly departed terrier, his fluffy paws and the buttery spot between his ears? And isn't the smell of Coppertone and barbeque and fat crabs in sauce the perfect memento of a summer spent vacationing off Cape Cod, washing over you like solace on a grey winter's day when everything seems dross and bleak? The way of high technology has looked like the final frontier to pin down smells, those most elusive sensual stimuli, escaping us in the destructive process that is smelling them (you inhale, they vanish soon after). Other posts in these pages have announced similar projects about capturing or transmitting smells via pixelized forms, but the Madeleine, an odor camera that captures the ambience around the object source, is named after the famous spontaneous memory brought over by the namesake dessert to French author Marcel Proust when he was tasting linded tea and the famous reminiscence he recounted in his "A la recherche du temps perdu". The Madeleine, with use in the perfume industry, aims to capture any scentscape and to inform via the most subliminal and potent sense of all: smell.



"Created by designer Amy Radcliffe, Madeleine is an “analog odor camera” based off so-called ‘Headspace Capture,’ a technology developed for the perfume industry to analyze and recreate the odor compounds that surround various objects. When a smell source is placed under the device’s glass cone, a pump extracts the smell via a plastic tube. After being drawn to Madeleine’s main unit, the smell goes through a resin trap which absorbs the particles so molecular information can be recorded. That data is expressed in a graph-like formula, which essentially contains a fingerprint of the smell. In a special lab, that formula can then be inscribed on a bronze disk to artificially reproduce the smell. The smell can also be recreated in small vials." [source]

So given the choice: What smells would you capture and recreate through this wonderful new gadget?

Special thanks to Trudie W. for alerting me to the news of this new gizmo!

Chemical Communication by Humans: Beyond Pheromones

The concept of being able to communicate emotions & conditions through body smell signals (i.e. signals of a chemical nature, same as other animals), has been at the bottom of lots of research into how humans interact. Pheromones haven't been proven to be a conclusive given yet (though theories abound), but other signals seem to have been at the focus of new research.

via simplovore.com

"To find out, researchers had male subjects watch two movies. One was scary, and the other made viewers feel disgusted. The researchers then collected the participants’ sweat. Female subjects then smelled the sweat, while the scientists recorded their facial expressions. And the women who smelled “fear sweat” actually produced fearful facial expressions. While those who smelled the “disgust sweat” made disgusted faces. The inference is that the chemical compounds impelled the female subjects to remotely experience the same emotions felt by the sweaty males. The study is in the journal Psychological Science." [Jasper H. B. de Groot et al, Chemosignals Communicate Human Emotions]

snippet via Chris Bartelett

Improving our Sense of Smell: a Little Wiring

"A new study reveals for the first time that activating the brain's visual cortex with a small amount of electrical stimulation actually improves our sense of smell. The finding published in the Journal of Neuroscience by researchers at the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital -- The Neuro, McGill University and the Monell Chemical Senses Center, Philadelphia, revises our understanding of the complex biology of the senses in the brain."

From the full article Open your eyes and smell the roses: Activating the visual cortex improves our sense of smell

"Sound Perfume": Glasses Emitting Personal Scent & Sound to Help Human Bonding

How would you like the concept of wearing a pair of glasses that transmits scent and sound and upon contact with another (with similar glasses on), the specs would trigger personal sound and smell to them? Sounds mad or another trick to bring people closer together by making a good first impression? Apparently scientists working on smell are developing just that. It works on wireless mobile communication with attachable modules on the glasses.

New Scientist explains how Sound Perfume works:

Sound Perfume consists of a pair of glasses fitted with speakers and odour emitters located behind the ears, along with an app running on a smartphone that connects to the glasses via Bluetooth. The idea is that you use the app to choose a personal sound and smell for others to experience when you meet them.
Infrared sensors in the glasses detect when you meet someone else using Sound Perfume and your cellphone sends your name, contact number and sound/smell preferences to their handset, which then triggers the appropriate response in their glasses. The current set-up makes use of eight different perfumes in the form of hard blocks that melt and release an aroma when gently heated by a wire to 46°C.

Whatever happens with this particular project, there's no doubt that communicating scent through electronic means is the way of the future.



via The Next Web

Why Does Pee Smell After Eating Asparagus?

Peeing after eating asparagus can be daunting: The liquid takes on a strange, pungent, rotten odour which can be off-putting, to say the least. But why is that?

Asparagus contains asparagusic acid which is broken down into volatile (smelly) chemicals released in the urine as soon as half an hour after consuming the vegetable. These chemical components responsible for this effect are: methanthiol, dimethyl sulfide, dimethyl disulfide, bis(methylthio)methane, dimethyl sulfoxide and dimethyl sulfone.

The really fascinating fact is that some people do not produce smelly pee after consuming asparagus (though they're rare among the population), and some people still might produce it yet not be able to smell it as offensive! Scientists have not gone into the screws & bolts of how and why this is, but the most widespread explanation is genetic variations: Some people have genes that dictate their system to process asparagusic acid somewhat differently, while variation in the smelling perception spectrum is hypothesized to be a combination of genetic and societal factors coming into play.

pic of asparagus via pellanews.gr