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The Science of Scent in Everyday Life
Crown
July 2008
On Sale: June 24, 2008
304 pages ISBN: 140008234X EAN: 9781400082346 Hardcover
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Non-Fiction
• How many smells are there? And how many molecules would
it take to create every smell in nature, from roses to
stinky feet? • Who was the bigger scent freak: the perfume-obsessed
Richard Wagner or Emily Dickinson, with her creepy passion
for flowers? • By scenting the air in stores, are retailers turning us
into subliminally controlled shopping zombies? • Were Smell-O-Vision and AromaRama mere Hollywood fads or
serious technologies? Everything about the sense of smell fascinates us, from its
power to evoke memories to its ability to change our moods
and influence our behavior. Yet because it is the least
understood of the senses, myths abound. For example,
contrary to popular belief, the human nose is almost as
sensitive as the noses of many animals, including dogs;
blind people do not have enhanced powers of smell; and
perfumers excel at their jobs not because they have
superior noses, but because they have perfected the art of
thinking about scents. In this entertaining and enlightening journey through the
world of aroma, olfaction expert Avery Gilbert illuminates
the latest scientific discoveries and offers keen
observations on modern culture: how a museum is preserving
the smells of John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row; why John Waters
revived the “smellie” in Polyester; and what innovations
are coming from artists like the Dutch “aroma jockey” known
as Odo7. From brain-imaging laboratories to the high-stakes
world of scent marketing, What the Nose Knows takes us on a
tour of the strange and surprising realm of smell.
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