Olfactory Fact #152: Bad Weather Makes You Stinkier

Low barometric pressure, which occurs naturally just before a storm, causes volatile fluids like perfume to spread from a person’s body into the atmosphere more quickly.

Ah, Sugar-Sugar!

Pop singer Katy Perry’s new cd will hit the shelves next week with a little something extra - it smells like cotton candy!

The singer says her fans will get a whiff of spun sugar when they open Teenage Dream, Perry’s sophomore album release.

“I had this idea to have the actual booklet of the CD scented, which is something I had never heard of anyone else doing, especially since the cover picture was of me on a cotton candy cloud,” says Perry. “I said, ‘Can we make this happen?’ You know I always have these crazy ideas… and it happened!”

Whiff-Guy C. Russell Brumfield had the very same “crazy idea,” and there’s even more good news for Perry than the obviously beneficial Endorphin Branding™ of her image in her aromatic new release. “If globally branded products are indeed scented in the future, it will create great difficulty for many counterfeiting enterprises,” says Brumfield in his bestselling book, Whiff! The Revolution of Scent Communication in the Information Age. “As it stands today, when a DVD or CD is released in the United States, frequently the pirated version is made available on the street the same day. Scenting legitimate products may not reduce the demand for pirated copies, but it would certainly assist in detection of the fakes by the local constabulary.”

Green Eggs & Science

Did you know that the eggs of the African Clawed Frog have exemplary ability to express olfactory receptors?

Nobuo Misawaa, Hidefumi Mitsunob, Ryohei Kanzakic, and Shoji Takeuchi did. That’s why the University of Tokyo research team employed the eggs in creating their novel new robotic nose.
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Got Garlic Breath?

Whether you’re scent marketing a product, an experience, or yourself - it’s not just about using what works, but also about eliminating what doesn’t. Garlic, for example. Anybody who loves anybody who loves garlic will tell you that it’s a decidedly unlovely signature scent, and a nearly-possible one to mask. The persistence of garlic-stink, not just on the breath but through the pores, is due to a compound called allyl methyl sulphide (AMS) which cannot be broken down during digestion, and is so released from the body through breath and sweat. Even brushing your teeth and scrubbing with deodorant soap are no cure.

Fortunately, food scientists at Ohio State University have found an antidote that’s spectacular in its simplicity. In short - Got Milk?

In tests with raw and cooked cloves, milk was shown to significantly reduce concentrations of AMS. Full-fat milk provided better results than skimmed, according to breath samples taken from a volunteer given chopped cloves to eat during the experiments. It is thought that milk fat suppresses the sulphurous properties of garlic.

“The best results would be obtained if diners drank milk with their meal, rather than afterwards,” says Professor Sheryl Barringer, who carried out the study. “This will enhance the deodorizing effect and mask the odor of garlic flavour during eating.”

There are other foods which are thought to limit garlic breath. They include prunes, basil, aubergine and some varieties of mushroom - but milk was better at masking the volatile compounds responsible for the smell.

However, the researchers warn that it might be wise not to go overboard on the dairy products. There are many anecdotal reports from Japanese and Chinese visitors to the UK that Britons smell of ’sour milk’ due to their calcium-rich diets.

Olfactory Fact #226: Stinky Feet are Aromatherapeutic

The age-old “shoe smell” treatment for epileptic seizure, still in practice in some developing countries, may have some basis in scientific fact; in temporal seizures with secondary generalization, strong olfactory stimuli can halt the progress of a seizure.

“If you can smell it, we can sell it!”

Electricity, vehicles and functioning technology are virtually non-existent in the post-apocalyptic wasteland of Mad Max - non-existent, that is, outside the seedy community of Bartertown, where Tina Turner’s minions have stumbled upon a seemingly-oxymoronic “clean” renewable energy source in the methane from pig feces.

The harvesting of methane from waste is not just cinematic fantasy, as it turns out. A landfill in Fargo, North Dakota is turning trash into cash in a way that would’ve made Auntie Entity stand up and take notice. When complaints from nearby residents prompted city officials to design a system for burning off the stinky methane generated by decomposing garbage at the city’s landfill site, officials at a nearby Cargill oilseed processing plant had other ideas - Why waste the potent gas by burning it off when it can instead be harnessed?

Last year alone, the methane gas that was formerly escaping into the atmosphere and noses of nearby residents generated almost $2 million for the city. Enough, says Fargo city commissioner Mike Williams, that the city did not have to raise property taxes on its residents. “If you can smell it we can sell it,” says Williams. “That which used to just be right under our nose turned into cash and new energies.”

A Debilitating Olfactory Phobia

It may be the most common syndrome you never heard of. Sufferers of a disabling psychiatric condition called Olfactory Reference Syndrome (ORS) are convinced that they emit horrible smells and, as a result, often isolate themselves or even attempt suicide.
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Forget the Steroids - Pass the Peppermint!

Can scent affect physical performance? Of course it can. Scent, as Whiff-fans know by now, can affect virtually everything. When psychologists at West Virginia’s Wheeling Jesuit University administered peppermint odors to weightlifters as they trained, the subjects were able to carry out increased numbers of repetitions and had better endurance. Other studies have produced similar results. When assessing performance on specific athletic tasks, athletes exposed to peppermint odor were able to complete a 400-metre dash more quickly, perform more push-ups, and demonstrate increased grip strength.

The implications of these findings were not lost on Dr. Bryan Raudenbush, who led the weightlifting study, and is now marketing an “endurance enhancing” peppermint nasal spray, Scentology, a “time-released, fully invigorating, fresh scent cue scientifically demonstrated to increase physical energy and performance” which “can be used to gain a competitive edge in athletics, or optimize your performance in the workplace.”

Traders Hotel Launches Signature Scent

When the former Hotel Jen was renovated and launched as Hong Kong’s first Traders Hotel on August 1st, it also became the first in the Traders’ fleet to incorporate the use of a signature scent in its public areas. The “tropical fruity-green” fragrance is supported by a “warm musk,” and will be introduced gradually in the other eleven Traders Hotels within the year.

The Traders properties are a more affordable alternative from Shangri-La Hotels and Resorts’, where Essence of Shangri-La is dispersed by an atomization system which features anti-bacterial and anti-smoke benefits as well.

Olfactory Fact #246: The Celeb-Scent Biz Began With Liz!

The first celebrity to launch a signature scent - a trend which now accounts for 23% of the Top 100 Women’s Fragrances - was Elizabeth Taylor, whose White Diamonds remains a top-seller.

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