Human body odour

The main aim of this paper was to document in which social contexts human body odour individuality may be functionally important. There is clear evidence that humans can recognize other people and discriminate or identify their body odour. Contrary to traditional thinking, smell therefore has the potential to be an integral... 

Abstract Human body odour is individually specific and several lines of evidence suggest that to some extent it is under genetic control. There are however numerous other sources of variation, commonly labelled as environmental factors, which are the main aim of this paper. These include 1) reproductive status, 2) emotional state, 3) diet and 4) diseases. We primarily focus on axillary and genital odours as they have been proposed to have communicative function. We prelusively conclude that a specific diet and some diseases have major impact on variations in human body odour. 

Okayama, Japan. He reported his new enzyme system in 2002, which he had extracted from a bacterium. This will convert starch to trehalose in high yields, bringing down its cost to 1% of what it had been when it was extracted from natural sources such as yeast. Hayashibara also reported that trehalose suppresses human body odour, especially that given off by old people who produce the somewhat odorous chemicals 2-nonenal and 2-octenal41)in their skin. When they use a 2% solution of trehalose as a body lotion it reduces the emission of these smelly compounds by about 70%. Maybe one day it will find cosmetic uses and no doubt be added to deodorants and body lotions, as the following advert from the future shows ... 

Apart from the use as a Quality Control device, other areas in which an artificial odour-sensing system could be utilized include all those in which classification of odour is required for example, human body odour, malodours and malodour counteractancy. Another area in which the new instrumentation could be utilized to advantage includes perfume substantivity, or diffusion from a substrate. For example, it could be used to measure levels of perfume in the air from a hard surface cleaner when used on a ceramic tile, or odour from human skin after spraying with a cologne, and so on. 

Human body odour may be described as a mixture of animal musk with a strong sandalwood-like component, sweat with a urine-like character, and a smell of fatty acids. Since body odour is also a part of one s private life, it means that to speak of it is to break ataboo. Normally people observe a distance to one another and apply - just in case - a decently dosed perfume. 

Abstract Sexual orientation influences human olfactory function. Following a brief review of the biological basis of homosexuality, this chapter explores exactly how olfactory function varies as a result of sexual orientation. Three separate areas of research are considered recent studies on the neural processing of social odorants by heterosexuals and homosexuals the influence of sexual orientation on the production and perception of body odours and the influence of female sexual orientation on menstrual synchrony. 

Abstract Humans produce temporarily stable, genetically mediated odour signatures and possess the ability to recognise, discriminate and identify other people through the sense of smell. The capability of self, gender, kin and non-kin odour recognition plays a role in social interactions. It seems that despite the stability of olfactory cues, the hedonic quality of body odour may vary over time. 

On the whole, it seems that humans are able to recognize their own body odour and women mostly tend to assess it as pleasant and men mostly as unpleasant. The significant results from experiments dealing with the question of the sexual partner s body odour recognition indicate that humans can learn their partner s olfactory cues, probably through their mutual intimacy. 

Havlicek, J., Bartos, L., Dvorakova, R. and Flegr, J. (2006) Non-advertised does not mean concealed. Body odour changes across the human menstrual cycle. Ethology 112, 81-90. 

For a socially living individual it is of high relevance to be aware of the emotional state of one s conspecifics. It is a fairly well-known phenomenon that animals of different species react to odour emitted by another animal which is under stressful conditions. This led several researchers to the question of whether emotional state in humans can influence their body odour. This possibility was first tested by Chen and Haviland-Jones (2000), who asked their subjects to wear armpit pads while watching 13 min excerpts from a comedy or a fearful movie. Most of them watched both excerpts. Subsequently three and six choice tests were presented to raters who were instructed to pick the sample that smelled of people when they are happy or... 

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