The word you'll be using this spring
Thursday, April 9, 2015, 9:18 AM - As rain targets many parts of the country including Ontario and Quebec, the smell attached to precipitation is something many are going to be comfortable with.
While many describe it as a rich, earthy smell that invades the air after a good period of rainfall, most don't know the word that is used to describe it: "petrichor"
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First coined by the Australian science organization CSIRO in 1964, the word is derived from the Greek words "petra" and "ichor" which translates to "the blood of Gods in stones".
"That many natural dry clays and soils evolve a peculiar and characteristic odour when [...] moistened with water, is recognized by all the earlier text books of mineralogy," said CSIRO scientist Isabel Bear in a paper published in the Nature journal.
After taking a closer look, scientists found a yellowish oil that was trapped inside the rocks they look at, but released by adding moisture. It was this oil (found in many kinds of sediments) that produces the smell people relate with rain.
"The diverse nature of the host materials has led us to propose the name 'petrichor' for this apparently unique odour which can be regarded as an 'ichor' or 'tenuous essence' derived from rock or stone," the study concluded.
The Science Behind the Smell
While Australians coined the name a long time ago, the mechanism behind the smell wasn't figured out for more than 50 years.
By taking a closer look at slow motion footage of raindrop impacts, MIT researchers found that raindrops, when striking the surface, trap tiny air bubbles beneath them, which then shoot back out in a fizz of tiny aerosols, possibly carrying the scent of earth with them, blown about by the wind.
“Until now, people didn’t know that aerosols could be generated from raindrops on soil,” Joung told MIT News. “This finding should be a good reference for future work, illuminating microbes and chemicals existing inside soil and other natural materials, and how they can be delivered in the environment, and possibly to humans."
Source: IFLScience
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