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Chemical Senses Advance Access originally published online on May 20, 2008
Chemical Senses 2008 33(6):575-579; doi:10.1093/chemse/bjn023
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Scent and Alchemy: The Paperback

The Secret of Scent: Adventures in Perfume and the Science of Smell, by Luca Turin. Harper Perennial edition, , 2007. 207 pp, Paperback, $13.95. ISBN 978-0-06-113384-8.

Thomas P. Hettinger, PhD

Department of Oral Health and Diagnostic Sciences, University of Connecticut Health Center, 263 Farmington Avenue, Farmington, CT 06030-1718, USA

e-mail: thetting{at}neuron.uchc.edu


  Abstract

The Secret of Scent by Luca Turin is an ethereal excursion into the world of perfumes and the science of smell. The lyrical and tantalizing descriptions will leave the reader with an enhanced appreciation of the most enigmatic of our senses. If there is a secret revealed, it is that the recognizable odor features of complex perfumes are simple and may be caused by a single type of molecule. Turin claims that odor quality is determined by infrared vibrations despite overwhelming evidence that chemical functional groups and shape determine odor. The vibration theory of olfaction is a kind of alchemy where commonplace waves are transmuted into exotic odors. Despite its transcendent appeal, the vibration theory of olfaction has no scientific basis. Isotope substitution in odor stimuli has practically no effect on odor. If vibrations determined odor, isotope substitution would evoke odor differences as large as the differences between colors of the rainbow. The mechanism of frequency analysis proposed by Turin—inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy—is erroneous because free electrons have no natural occurrence in biology. Turin can be appreciated for his art of perfumery, but his "science" of smell is contrary to facts and basic scientific principles.

Accepted 16 April 2008


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