For the foreseeable future, one of the tastiest tidbits
of olfactory science will be this – the most accurate measurement of olfactory
stimulus available to science uses light. That's right, the best way to know
what a smell is, is to “see” it.
Smell comes from molecules, but not the kind you can see
with the naked eye. Smelly molecules are vaporous, and vapors invisible. But on
a molecular level, if you pulse a molecule with light, it emits light back. And
if you measure the color of that light, you can identify the molecule. This is
called spectroscopy, because instead of a yardstick, we use a spectrum of
colors. And this is also called irony, because we use colors to smell. And this,
is the nature of olfaction, because it is the most confusing, mysterious, and nonsensical
of all our senses.
Post Script
The same technological advances that are presaging
quantum computation via optic modulators are refining molecular spectroscopy
techniques:
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