Body odor

Body odor, Bromhidrosis or body odour is the smellof bacteriagrowing on the body. These bacteria multiply considerably in the presence of sweat, but sweat itself is almost totally odorless. Body odor is associated with the hair, skin, breasts, armpitsand genitals.

Body odor is specific to the individual (except for identical twinsin the same environment), and can be used to identify people, though this is more often done by dogsthan by humans. An individual's bodily odor is also influenced by diet, gender, genetics, health, medication, occupation, and mood. 17th century Japanese encountering Europeans for the first time found their odor particularly strong, and blamed it on the butterEuropeans ate. The term bata-kusai (roughly meaning "stinks of butter") was soon used to describe Europeans and still connotes anyone obviously Western. [1]

Social history

In the period of 1910-1920, the American advertising industry initiated the now-familiar strategy of advertisements intended to foster anxiety about social status, and concern about personal deficiencies that could be remedied by buying the advertised product. In 1919, Odo-Ro-No became the first company to use the term "B.O." in an advertisement.

Many humans find the odor of Corynebacteriumtenuis and C. xerosis in the apocrinesweat of the underarmsoffensive, so they use antiperspirants or deodorants. Antiperspirants stop the sweat, while deodorants kill or inhibit the bacteria. Some individuals find underarm perspirationuncomfortable (or visually offensive if it becomes noticeable on clothing), and use antiperspirants to counter this. Others refrain from using antiperspirants, sometimes due to a viewing perspiration as a natural bodily function that should not be hindered, and sometimes due to naturally low levels of perspiration that can be comfortably managed without antiperspirants. Individuals who choose not to use antiperspirants may or may not choose to use non-antiperspirant deodorants, according to personal preference.

Genetics

Body odor is influenced by the major histocompatibility complex(MHC) molecules. These are genetically determined and play an important role in immunityof the organism. The vomeronasal organcontains cells sensitive to MHC molecules in a genotype-specific way. Experiments on animals and volunteers shown the potential sexual partners tend to be perceived more attractive if their MHC composition is substantially different. This behavior pattern promotes variability of the immune system of individuals in the population, thus making the population more robust against new diseases.

See also

• Pheromone

External link

• The Scientist- Immunity, smell linked, November 2004

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body+odor Wikipedia article Body odor.