MONDAY JANUARY 14 2002
Pongs of war
SCIENCE BRIEFING BY ANJANA AHUJA
The Pentagon wants to get right up its enemies’ noses — literally. It wants to produce a stink bomb so offensive that it disables harmlessly those unlucky enough to sniff it. As well as being used on the battlefield, it could be an effective way of dispersing crowds. At the request of the US Defence Department, scientists at the Monell Chemical Senses Centre in Philadelphia have been concocting some truly malodorous scents. They have focused on biological smells such as body odour and the pong of human excrement — these have the advantage of being loathed across all cultures. The most retch-worthy fragrance developed so far, according to a report last week in Chemical & Engineering News, is a foul mixture of rotting meat and human waste.
The smell induces an immediate physical reaction — shortness of breath, a rapid heart rate, nausea and an understandable desire to move as far away as possible from the source.
Trying to create a putrid perfume has not been easy. People vary widely in their perceptions of what smells disgusting or delicious. For example, that perennial favourite in the schoolboy armoury — rotten eggs — was simply not nasty enough for the job in hand.
“We had some quite unpleasant sulphur smells, and some people just weren’t all that repelled,” says Dr Pamela Dalton, one of the researchers working on the project. A similarly disappointing reaction greeted the odour of burnt hair.
Dalton adds: “Some thought it was nauseating, and some thought it smelt like dinner.”
===== Kevin Dean Buffalo, NY ICQ: 8616001 http://www.yaysoft.com
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