I am 23 years old. I am pretty much done with binge drinking to the point that I don’t remember how I came home. But you know, I’ve been there. I’ve been carried home before. Once, I woke up and thanked God for waking up in my bed. Or, I had a roommate who always managed to get home really drunk. She would casually walk in and just pass out on the sofa. I feel like we just knew we had to go home and somehow made it; human instinct is super impressive. Apparently, it might be something else that guided us or enabled us to come home.

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7fXa2Occ_U

Featured in the video is how dogs have 300 million olfactory receptor cells to see the world, tracking the past and predicting the future.

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl0Ii29XmNk

Featured in the video is how homing pigeons use their sense of smell to map their way home.

As we are also an animal, of course, we can do the same. Lucia Jacobs, a UC Berkeley psychology professor, conducted investigations where humans were blindfolded to navigate themselves by smelling scents. This was the first ever testing of such experimental study. “What we’ve found is that humans have the capability to orient ourselves along highways of odors and crisscross landscapes using only our sense of smell,” said Lucia Jacobs.

Her data included two dozen study volunteers. They were blindfolded and had headphones, in which made them concentrate on their sense of smell. The room was a 25-by-20 foot room with gridded floor and had 32 containers placed around the room that diffused different scents. These containers also worked as location markers. When the volunteers first walked into the room, they had to walk in circles; then, on a specific grid, they inhaled a combination of two fragrances. Then, they were walked in circles again. After being disoriented, they were asked to find the starting point where they inhaled the two fragrances. On average, the volunteers were able to orient themselves within 90 seconds.

The result was surprising. No one thought this was possible. This was never tested, because no one questioned it before. I am sure there are more things our olfactory system can do. Like how smelling certain scents bring back memories that are associated with them, I question if scents could be used to alter our memories as well.