Ever watch 'Perfume: The Story of a Murderer'? Women would definitely not be comfortable if there were people similar to the protagonist hanging around in dark alleys looking for the perfect scent. For one thing, perfume makers have gotten savvy to the nasal facts of life- imagine a perfume that evokes the cricket field (if you're a big fan of cricket, that is)...changing rooms, cricket bats as well as the cabins of ocean-going yachts!Will Andrews, a fragrance scientist working at Procter and Gamble says they've been, "...looking for modern smells that have never been used in fragrances before but which have strong associations with activities that people enjoy or respect...". Andrews is no slouch; he's been working dedicatedly to help create fragrances for Hugo Boss, Dolce & Gabbana and Lacoste just to name a few.
So what's the aim behind the study? Well, Andrews' believes he can find the "notes" within odors found in places; this means, if you like the smell of a golf course, you'd most likely find a fragrance which would evoke that positive emotion! Mixed with other fragrances, the choices are almost infinite! As Andrews says, "...smell is the most evocative of the senses. Just a faint whiff of a particular odor can conjure up memories and emotions in a way that no other sense can achieve."
Andrews calls the process of finding the perfect scent- 'headspace analysis'- it involves sucking air from a room or area deemed to have interesting smells using a pump. For tech freaks, the process involves passing air over polymer beads to trap the odor molecules for concentration. The beads are then placed in a gas chromatograph where they are warmed up. The odor molecules evaporate from the beads and are sucked into the machine to be analyzed. Once the structure of the molecules is known they can be duplicated artificially in the quantities needed for perfume. Presto, you've got a nasally happy audience!
Just for kicks; did you know that P&G are also trying to bottle the "electronic" smell of a warm computer? Yeah, some people just can't get enough of their PC and MAC, they've have to literally bottle that!
