Zachy Hennessey
January 28

You may not think it’s so important, but scientific research has done a lot to prove that your sense of smell has a lot of value besides checking if that two-week old cream cheese is starting to go bad (it is).

We here at ISRAEL21c have been covering breakthroughs in smell research for over a decade; below are seven of the more incredible olfactory discoveries over the last few years that are sure to pique your interest — and your nose. 

1. Like ‘white noise,’ there’s ‘white smell’

In 2012, a team of researchers from the Weizmann Institute of Science (led by the noted olfactory researcher Prof. Noam Sobel) discovered that it’s possible to make a smell that our brains perceive as completely neutral — a so-called “white smell.”

Just like white noise and the color white itself are blends of audio frequencies and light waves, respectively, white smell can be created by taking an amalgamation of about 30 different points across the scent spectrum and blending them together.

They even invented a fancy name for the new smell: Laurax. That’s going right to the top of my “names for obscure smells” list, right above “Petrichor” (the smell that comes after a long-awaited rain), and right below “Yuckamolis” (my four-year-old’s description of the smell of my feet).

2. If you can’t smell, you’ll die faster

Bad news if your sniffer’s out of commission: According to research published this year in Nature Communications, people who don’t have a sense of smell have a reduced life expectancy.

Researchers at Weizmann found that people who don’t have a functioning olfactory sense have unique breathing patterns that could be linked to depression, anxiety and other negative health outcomes which, all in all, add up to a minus on life’s upper limits.

A bit off our topic, but nonetheless fascinating, the same paper reveals the critical importance of sighing to good health. The researchers explain that “to maintain life, patients need not only to breathe rhythmically, but also sigh every 5 min[utes] or so, as this is critical for preventing collapse of alveoli in the lungs.”

3. Your nose has spots for different smells

You may have heard that different parts of your tongue can taste different flavors. Well, the same goes for your nose.

Back in 2011, Sobel and a group of Weizmann researchers found that there are specific areas in your nose dedicated to processing pleasant and unpleasant smells. 

This means that there are objective ways to measure whether an odor is actually bad and not a matter of personal taste: if the “yucky” sensors are the ones that process the smell of rotten fish, for example, then it’s a safe bet that rotten fish is definitively a bad smell.

“We uncovered a clear correlation between the pattern of nerve reaction to various smells and the pleasantness of those smells. As in sight and hearing, the receptors for our sense of smell are spatially organized in a way that reflects the nature of the sensory experience,” Sobel noted.

4. Our friends smell like us

Research conducted by — you guessed it — the Weizmann Institute in 2022 discovered that we tend to be friendlier with people who smell like we do.

Using a fancy electronic nose, researchers discovered that close friends often share similar body odor patterns, a finding that goes beyond mere coincidence. 

The team put this theory to the test with both existing friends and strangers, finding they could predict with 71 percent accuracy which people would form social bonds based on smell similarity alone.

5. The smell of women’s tears makes men less aggressive

Weizmann scientists also discovered that women’s tears contain chemicals that significantly reduce aggressive behavior in men.

In the experiments, men who sniffed women’s tears (without knowing what they were smelling) showed 44% less aggressive behavior in a revenge-based game compared to when they sniffed saline.

 As we all (definitely) know, a similar phenomenon has been observed in other animal populations, like mice. The crazy thing is, humans don’t even have the biological parts necessary to detect the signals that lady tears give off — our noses just pick up on the odorless chemicals and our brains know what to do in response.

Considering this discovery, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a lot more sports bars having a spray bottle of woman tears on hand to cool off rowdy patrons.

6. Your nose could keep you on life support

If you’re in a coma — first of all, I’m impressed that you’re reading this, but also — your nose may be able to communicate with the doctors around you.

Scientists at (drumroll please…) the Weizmann Institute and Loewenstein Rehabilitation Hospital discovered that, by measuring changes in patients’ nasal airflow when exposed to different odors (like fragrant shampoo or rotten fish), those who showed even slight reactions to smells had a 100% rate of regaining consciousness during the four-year study period. 

The test also predicted with 92% accuracy which patients would survive for at least three years.

This discovery is a big deal because current methods of diagnosing consciousness in brain-injured patients can be wrong up to 40% of the time, which affects critical decisions about life support and pain management. The new “sniff test” is simple, inexpensive and can be done at a patient’s bedside.

The bad news is that this seriously amplifies the negative effects of entry No. 2 on this list. There’s truly no rest for the smell bereft.

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Jason Harris

Jason Harris

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