Chemical Forums
Specialty Chemistry Forums => Other Sciences Question Forum => Topic started by: ruffle on September 01, 2016, 04:09:56 AM
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Hi all,
I am just wondering if there are any way to estimate how far something (e.g. flowers) could be smelled. I am aware that it is dependent on odor concentration, but maybe there are some general formulas that gives rough estimates??
many thanks for any insights!!
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Wind speed and direction will play a part also. Maybe volatility of the scent.
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You could probably model the problem using Fick's laws of diffusion (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fick%27s_laws_of_diffusion).
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Also, humans have varying sensitivities to various chemicals, some can be smelled in very dilute amounts, others need to be more concentrated. This is a way too complicated question to solve, as you've written it.
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Also, humans have varying sensitivities to various chemicals, some can be smelled in very dilute amounts, others need to be more concentrated. This is a way too complicated question to solve, as you've written it.
yea - also I think some humans build up further sensitivities or tolerances to specific smells. I think I have become loess tolerant to the smell of styrene monomers and their derivatives over the years. The smell never used to bother me.... after 4 years of working with them nearly 20 years ago they actually made me feel horrible when I could smell them and just the slightest amount I could detect and shy away from. I remembered this recently when I was asked to look at some styrene for some reason and instantly remembered the smell and went all light headed. (It is supposed to be used in a fume hood, but even just seeing a bottle of the stuff sets my nose off, scrunching up in disgust). The styrene smell isn't all that bad (although carcinogenic I think), I actually like the smell in a way, but I have had too much of it and it makes me feel terrible in the head at the slightest exposure.... like a soreness in my nasal membranes, lips, throat and lungs. I would be happy never to get a wiff of it again.
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Every single time I work with diethyl ether, no matter how careful I am with the fume hood I still get a splitting headache. Pisses me right off
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Every single time I work with diethyl ether, no matter how careful I am with the fume hood I still get a splitting headache. Pisses me right off
Poor you - I used to like that smell. I think dichloromethane used to smell nice too. I can't remember which one smells of which, but both were nice iirc.