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Thursday, October 16, 2008

Smell Science by Machine Olfaction

You can see from recent posts that I have been researching smell science. Not too long ago I mentioned MIT's digital nose. I have been working my way through Russell Brumfield's densely provocative Whiff! The Revolution of Scent Communications in the Information Age. No aspect of smell research and delivery uncovered. On the topic of artificial noses, also called machine olfaction, he mentions the E-Nose, which came out of CIT, and was licensed to Cyrano Sciences and became the portable Cyranose 320. (You cannot make that up) Put to use in the food industry to detect spoilage and other toxic emissions. Mentioned in an IDEO case study. Eventually was bought by Smiths Detection to be determine if it could also be used for physical diagnostics. I see it is no longer featured in their technology list. So that may mean there has been a pause in development of machine olfaction. The MIT nose may be an indicator of new interest in the area.

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