TESTING SMELL SENSE

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31230, 30 November 1966, Page 18

TESTING SMELL SENSE

“Olfatometer” is the name of this complex apparatus —■ the first in this country—being demonstrated for the first time to Christchurch Girls’ High School pupils who visited the psychology and sociology departments of the University of Canterbury yesterday.

The university now has one of the only five laboratories in the world devoted entirely

to studying the sense of smell.

The apparatus consists of a plastic cabinet in which the person under test sits in front of a big panel of switches. The operator outside pumps into the cabinet a succession of “smells” created from chemicals. With four air-flow meters, the smells can be controlled to proportions as fine as one part in a thousand million.

After each test the cabinet can be cleared quickly with a blast of clean air.

Any Concentration

Smells can then be presented in any concentration. By pressing switches in the cabinet, the subject under test records when the smell is first noted, whether it is slight or intense and a number of degrees in between, and also whether the smell is pleasant or noisome.

Dr. R. A. M. Gregson, who is in charge of the project, said yesterday that the apparatus was based partly on an American design and partly on his own developments. (He has a degree in mechanical engineering as well as in science and psychology). Nearly £4OOO has been pro-

vided by the research committee of the University Grants Committee. The notable feature, Dr. Gregson said, was that the Christchurch apparatus was largely automated, both in the control of smells presented and the recording of responses.

One Panel

The whole of a test could be regulated from one control panel and connexions were built in so that the apparatus could eventually be linked directly to a computer. Also built in were devices to study the effects of light and taste on smell. Dr. Gregson said the apparatus would first be used experimentally by a Ph.D. student next year. Much wider uses later were expected. Dr. Gregson said the psychology department was now well on the way to having separate laboratories to study all the major senses. There was one for hearing, one for taste, one for smell, and one for sight would follow later. The picture shows Dr. Gregson at the control panel directing a smell

to a girl in the cabinet.