The human sense of smell can detect 1,000 billion different odors.

The human sense of smell can detect about 1,000 billion different odors. This is the conclusion of scientists in a study published in the American magazine Science on March 20.

Illustration photo. (Source: giftsanddec.com)

Scientists at Rockefeller University conducted a total of more than 6,700 olfactory tests on 26 volunteers. Accordingly, the scientists randomly mixed 128 different scents, then gave each volunteer 3 mixed bottles, including two bottles of the same scent and one bottle of a different scent, to test their olfactory ability.

Volunteers were asked to identify which jar smelled different from the other two. Based on the test results, scientists estimate that the average person can recognize at least 1,000 billion different smells.

Andreas Keller, the head of the research project, said the results were a big surprise to scientists who have long underestimated the human sense of smell. However, Keller also emphasized that the ability of the human sense of smell to distinguish odors today is much more limited than before.

Scientists previously believed that humans could only distinguish about 10,000 smells, while vision could perceive millions of different colors and hearing could perceive 500,000 tones./.

According to VNA