Stuff You Should Know - How China's Pollution Sniffers Work

Episode Date: October 2, 2008

In China's Guangdong province, twelve volunteers have been trained to detect harmful pollution by using their sense of smell. Check out this HowStuffWorks podcast to learn more about China's pollution sniffers. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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at the Alabama Industrial School for Negro children and how those five girls changed everything. Listen to unreformed on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you? Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from HowStuffWorks.com. Hi, and welcome to the podcast. My name's Josh. The guy across from me is named Chuck. Say hi, Chuck. Hi, how are you? Hey, Chuck. You know, I was reading an article today and basically they've recently found out that air pollution, as if it weren't bad enough for your lungs, it actually interferes with your heart's electrical activity. You're kidding. No, no, I would not kid about that,

Chuck. I take the heart's electrical activity very seriously. I bet you do. Yeah, so basically our bodies can kind of get rid of particles. Right. Then there's fine particles, which are a little more difficult. Now we have something called ultrafine particles, which are like sub microscopic. They basically get into your body and just wreak all manner of havoc. Right. And as far as I know, we weren't aware that it really interfered with any process of the heart up to this point. But yeah, basically, I think it was the Journal of the American Heart Association where this study was published. And when somebody undergoes some sort of heart surgery, that kind of thing, they recommend that they avoid traffic anyway, right? For stress levels. Exactly. Yeah, because

you know how upset you get in traffic. I've seen you. Don't pretend like you don't. No, I take the subway, bro. I'm traffic free. Right. And why do you take the subway? Because traffic makes me crazy. Precisely. So they used to recommend that heart patients stay away from traffic for two to three weeks after getting back from the hospital. And they still do, but now for this other reason, because all this traffic pollution can interfere with your heart's electrical activity. Is this only big cities or is it across the board? Oh, across the board, I would imagine. Because I mean, if you have your window rolled down and you're in any kind of traffic, you're just sucking that stuff, of course. And now some places are worse than others. I know one place where they

would recommend you not drive after a heart attack. Where would that be? China. China, yes. Pretty much anywhere in China. There are some rural parts of China that are pretty clean, you know, lots of trees, that kind of thing. But just about any city in China is going to have a pretty high level pollution. As a matter of fact, as far as I know, in 2006, the World Bank, Fine Bank, conducted a survey of the 20 most polluted cities in the world. This is amazing to me. 16 of the 20 were in China. I know. That's four fifths. I know. Right? Yeah. That's four fifths. By my math, that sounds good to me. That is a lot. So I don't know if Beijing fell off of that, because China pulled out all the stops to keep Beijing's pollution down during the Olympics.

Well, I know. I remember watching, I believe some, was it U.S. cyclists that kind of caused a little bit of a stir when they showed up in Beijing wearing masks, breathing masks? I hadn't seen that. I know that all manner of athletes were saying that they may not go compete in Beijing, because they took very seriously the damage it was going to do to their bodies. Yeah. They were walking around wearing masks, and a lot of people were pretty upset about that. Yeah. Well, I mean, how can you blame them? I've seen pictures. I've never been to Beijing. Neither have I. But unless these photos were retouched, it was, it was pretty serious stuff. Well, I think I know where this is leading. Yeah. I think you do too, because, you know,

we planned it out ourselves. Right. Pollution sniffing. Right. There was a group that was assembled. And as far as I know, they weren't assembled specifically for the Olympics. I don't think they've been disbanded, I guess, is what I mean, that the Olympics are over. To walk around a province in China, the Guangdong province, please forgive me any, any one of Chinese ancestry or from China for that terrible, terrible pronunciation. But they walk around the Guangdong province and sniff out air pollution. And they're trained to do so. Very highly trained, actually. Yes. It's, it's kind of an unbelievable thing, but it's really true.

It is true. It is true. Again, I've never met any of these people, but I can tell you, from all reports, this is, this is a real thing. Basically, they took, they took a group of, I guess, above average smellers. I imagine that they're probably not smokers. There were some requisites and they took them into this, this laboratory and had them sniff different noxious smells to train their senses. Correct. Right. Yeah. Yeah. But they did it very intensively. And there's actually a study that came out of, I think, Northwestern that showed that the more you sniff a certain smell, the more of an expert you become in it. Right. You can hone in and get more specific within that smell. Correct. It becomes much more complex. Right. So, I mean,

for example, if you smell a flower, a certain flower, the first time you smell it, you've created a, it's been coated. Right. There's a sense memory in your brain. Exactly. And anytime you see that, that kind of flower, that scent memory is probably going to be triggered. So, you're beginning this visual information like, oh, there's that flower and this is what it smells like, you know. So, once it becomes coated, it's there, but it can, the complexity of our idea of what the thing smells like can be expanded and, and subtracted from as far as I mean, we're fine. Sure. So, this generally happens over time, like you smell the flower once in a while. Right. You know, with the China Pollution Sniffers, this was a very intensive

training period. It was over and over again. Smell this sulfur. Smell this sulfur. You have no choice. Right. Locked in a room. Elbow in the back of the neck kind of thing. Exactly. Locked in a room smelling these things. And it's not a pleasant task. And they even are on record saying that it is no fun. No, because they were also trained to smell harmless smells as well. Noxious, like, like terribly offensive odors, but ones that weren't necessarily harmful. Right. So, apparently these people were trained to walk past any, you know, garbage dump or smokestack and go, you know, there's X amount of sulfur in there and I smell a little black carbon and maybe some dog poop. That's not that bad, but it's in there. I can tell you, because I've been trained. An egg

roll. Sure. Maybe so. Maybe so. A spring roll to say the least. So, the one thing I never figured out was why. I get the who, the how, the when, the what. I never figured out the why. Why would you train people to smell? Well, I would think because they could pinpoint, you know, pollution and do something about it. Or is that not the case? Well, we could anyway with electronic sensors. Are you talking about the NASA device? That's one of many. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure if you want, I've got car keys. I know you took the train, but we could go to Radio Shack right now and I'm pretty sure we could probably find some sort of olfactory sensing device, an electronic version of it. At Radio Shack? Probably. If it were a good Radio Shack, it would depend on the

location. But I don't understand like why you would train humans to do this. The one clear point is you can send the Radio Shack or the NASA olfactory sensor out and it will report back you know, there's this many parts per million of, you know, carbon dioxide or sulfur or whatever in the air, but it's not going to have any reaction. A human would. Right. So it's, the human would be like, you know, oh, there's sulfur dioxide and I'm dying, which is really the one real drawback with the pollution. Exactly. When you have humans doing this, it takes its toll on, you know, not only their senses, but their health. So it does make you wonder why they would send people in there. There is no need for the outside world because we are removed from it and apart from it and

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of shows that they weren't going to be disbanded after the Olympics, right? Because the olfactory sense does deteriorate over time. Sure. But the exposure to these harmful chemicals, especially in the training seminar or segment of the of the the whole Pollution Sniffing Academy, I would think would really pose a serious health risk. Right. I would think they would use the, you know, we're talking about the NASA thing a minute ago, the Enos is what they call it. It was just as cute. Of course. Is that a lot of that name? And they'd use that on the space shuttle, right? To detect ammonia leaks. Yeah. Which makes a lot of sense that they wouldn't send a human up in the space shuttle to, you know, sniff or money, right? It seems like a sign around is

her next thing like ammonia sniffer, right? Or I break for ammonia, right? Well, the other the other argument against that, aside from, you know, that being a suicide mission is that a human just can't smell it as well as this Enos can. Exactly. You know, we can get, you know, X number of parts per million, let's say, you know, several hundred parts per million before we realize, Oh, there's an ammonia leak and I'm dead. Right. This Enos can sniff something at like, I think one part per million, one part per million. You're right. So it knows the ammonia leak is going on long before any human has even sniffed ammonia. And you know how noxious and smelly ammonia is. Sure. So that's, that's the purpose of the Enos. And it goes on. It's equally impressive

of down here on earth. It can tell the difference between Coke and Pepsi. That's what I've read. It's so awesome. And not, not by tasting, obviously. No, no, no, just by smelling, just by smelling. And the other one, it can sense it can, it can sniff an electrical fire before the fire actually breaks out. Wow. Yeah. So, so the Jet Propulsion Laboratories Enos is a very valuable item to have on board when you're in space. Well, one thing I found interesting, Josh, when I was reading this was that the way smell works is sort of like the way taste works. Yeah, we don't know. And I know we've talked about that. Well, I'm talking about specifically the shape of the smell receptors and taste receptors. Well, that's a, that's a theory. They have the

same theory for how we taste and how we smell, but they both boil down to the fact that their, their theories, we don't know for certain exactly what's going on. These are, these are pretty good theories. You want, you want to tell them about the, the receptor idea? Well, it's, it's about the shape, like a certain smell will fit a certain shape for the, in the, in the olfactory bundle. Is that what it's called? Yes. The olfactory nerve. Right. Well, these are receptors at the end. They're all specialized. Exactly. But not too specialized because one thing I found really interesting was that some of the molecules, the shape and structure have completely different smells. Right. You can have two molecules that

have the same shape, same structure. You can't tell anything, any difference between them. Right. But they have, but they register as different smells, which kind of shoots a hole in the, I think it's called the lock and key theory, which they have for taste as well. A certain, certain molecules unlock a certain receptor. Right. So we've got the same thing for taste in, in the same thing for smell. And they're both equally shoddy theories, although they're, they're the predominantly accepted theories. Right. But if, if the smell molecules can be the same, if they, they can double up, does that explain things like maybe if your fart smells like lasagna?

I think if your fart smells like lasagna, you may have some sort of synesthesia. I'm not entirely certain, but you may want to consult a physician if your fart smells like lasagna. I wasn't speaking personally. I just use that as an example. That's okay Chuck. Okay. Okay. So, yeah, I think you have different, you, different receptors can be assaulted at the same time. Right. To produce a combination. Sure. Um, much like jelly bellies. You know, have, have you ever eaten jelly belly jelly beans? Uh, I'm not a jelly bean guy. These things are not jelly beans. All right. Anyway, if you get a bag of these things on the back, it says like, you know,

two blueberry plus one, I think toasted marshmallow creates like this flavor of like a, a blueberry muffin. Right. So there's different recipes. You can come up with your own. It's very fun. Are these the ones that are kind of nasty to like they have booger and no booger that I've come across. I think you're confusing a Harry Potter with reality again. Yeah. Well, um, maybe I am, they don't, I don't know. Maybe they, if anybody has jalapeno flavored jelly beans, it would probably be jelly belly. Um, but they, they're generally pretty good. They, they have some pretty good ones, although they do have some that are non-traditional like coffee and cappuccino. Well, maybe we should send some of these to our

pollution sniffing friends in China. Oh, they could tell the difference. I guarantee. I bet. Yeah. So, uh, you got everything. You got that. You got the pollution sniffers down. Yeah. I feel sorry for these guys. It doesn't sound like a great job. They volunteered. Oh, they did? Yes. They volunteered. No one pressed them into service. German Mao is long, long dead. So yes, and they are paid probably pretty well. So don't feel too terribly bad. They're doing this on their own accord and they're helping, you know, the people in Guangdong province by keeping them from harm. Hopefully. So yeah, we sold me good. And you can learn more about pollution sniffers on how stuff works.com. We have a search bar that's waiting

just for you. Let us know what you think. Send an email to podcast at how stuff works.com. Brought to you by the reinvented 2012 Camry. It's ready. Are you in 1968, five black girls were picked up by police after running away from a reform school in Mount Megs, Alabama. I'm writer and reporter Josie Duffy Rice. And in a new podcast, I investigate the abuse that thousands of black children suffered at the Alabama Industrial School for Negro children and how those five girls changed everything. Listen to unreformed on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 1980, cocaine was captivating and corrupting Miami. The cartels, they just killed everybody that was home. Setting an

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