The World of Smell

To capture the fragrance of a flower without having to kill it, IFF uses a kind of "smell camera" that detects and absorbs the particles that surround a plant to record its scent. The information is then translated into a formula with the help of chromatography and spectrometry, techniques that help identify the many components that make up a flower's scent. Using the formula, scientists can recreate the smell. Before such smell cameras were available, it was more common to have to take cuttings from flowers, which scientists say can change the way they smell. The method shown here is designed to capture how a living flower actually smells to the human nose. This purple flower is a Dendrobium Southeast, a hybrid of a hybrid that comes from Australia and New Guinea.