(elevator dings)
(gentle elevator music)
- [Bellhop] Welcome to
the Information Elevator.
This is How Stuff Works
preditor Paul Dechant,
a player of the guitar, a connoisseur
of chicken fried steak, and a collector
of commemorative movie posters,
not to mention a prince among men.
Right now Paul may be picking
up on the creme brulee
I just ate in the bellhop lounge room.
After all, we carry around
with us a database of smells,
derived from our daily activities.
And cling they do, but those
external scents are nothing
when it comes to the
ones your body releases
through a prism of perspiration.
A collective stench as
unique as our fingerprints.
Microbes are important to the production
of the small aromatic molecules
that give us our fragrance profiles.
Diet, age, genetics,
medications, lifestyle,
lotions, and soap can all
influence the thousands
of communities of bacteria
that cohabitate peacefully
among the tiny crevices in your epidermis,
churning out your personal perfume.
Now consider that when sweat
first emerges on your skin,
it's odorless, until it's
colonized by bacteria.
Apocrine sweat, rich in
proteins and fatty acids,
often resides in your armpit.
In exchange for metabolizing sweat,
breaking down the lipids
in it, for instance,
moist-loving bacteria like staphylococcus
and corynebacterium, are known
to belch out chicken-sulfury,
onion-like and clary sage talk notes.
But here's the rub.
No two people smell things the same way.
Or so says Hiroaki Matsunami,
at Duke School of Medicine,
who found that between two people,
about 30% of the odor
receptors are different.
And yet, subliminally,
we may be picking up
on the subtle cues as
to one another's health.
Diabolical researchers from
the Karolinska Institutet,
injected study participants
with either lipopolysaccharide,
a bacterial toxin that produces
a strong immune response,
or with salt water.
The sweaty pits of their
t-shirts were cut out,
and stuffed into bottles, where later,
40 students gave the samples a good sniff.
The results, the odor
samples belonging to those
who had immune responses
were judged as more intense,
less pleasant, and overall, less healthy.
And the stronger the immune response,
the stronger the reactions
by the student sniffers.
How do you like your invisible
cloak of odor now, sir?
(elevator dings)
(playful music)
