Flowers have been used for centuries to cover up the smell of death and express sympathy at funerals. They were originally used for odor control as the body decomposed, and flowers and candles were placed around the body to mask the unmistakable whiff of bodily decay. Lilies, particularly white lilies, are often associated with the restored innocence of the soul of the deceased.
The art of embalming has evolved over the years, and while modern ways to preserve bodies have become more common, flowers have always served a practical purpose in funerals. Lilies, such as ginger blossoms, Oriental lilies, and other fragrant flowers, are often placed around the body, thickly bunched in vases, and arranged on wreaths propped on standing easels nearby. These flowers help cover the casket with their strong smell and help cover the smell in addition to other activities.
In ancient times, flowers were not only tokens of respect but also used as a means to help cover up the unpleasant odors of the deceased. Lilies are the most popular flowers for funerals because they are beautiful and have a strong and aromatic scent. They represent restored innocence in a soul after a person has died, and white lilies symbolize purity and innocence.
When a holy person dies, they are reported to smell of lilies, violets, and roses, which can be interpreted as a sign of a corrupt nature. By choosing funeral flowers that reflect your emotions and honor the deceased, you can create a meaningful and meaningful experience for the deceased.
📹 Can you actually smell metal?
Sorry, the shirts shown in this video are no longer available 🙁 If metal has no odor and you can’t smell it, then what are we …
Why did the body smell at the funeral?
The smell of decomposition is a common occurrence after death, where the body begins to decompose to be returned to the earth for reuse. This process is typically slowed down by refrigeration until embalming, cremating, or burial. However, when a body is not found immediately, the decomposing smell is overwhelming and indescribable. The reason for this smell is not the dead body itself, but the gas-producing bacteria inside the body. Once the body dies, bacteria in the organs, particularly the pancreas and intestines, run out of nutrients and start digesting the body.
These bacteria are released into the rest of the body, and the gas they emit while digesting is released. This gas fouls the air and can build pressure within the body, potentially leading to an explosion. This process can take 2-3 days.
How do funeral directors stop a body from smelling?
Embalming is a process of preservation that replaces the blood of the deceased with a solution designed to prevent the growth of bacteria, thereby preventing decomposition and the development of foul odors. Additionally, funeral homes may utilize disinfectants to eradicate any existing bacterial contamination on the body.
What did the embalmers cover the body with?
Embalming, an ancient technique, was developed by Egyptian priests as early as the First Dynasty (3200 BCE). This involved removing organs, ridding the body of moisture, and covering it with natron, a desiccating salt found in the Wadi El Natrun. The ancient Egyptians believed that mummification allowed the soul to return to the preserved corpse after death. Other cultures that used embalming techniques include the Meroites, Guanches, Peruvians, Jivaro Indians, Aztecs, Toltecs, Mayans, and Tibetan and southern Nigerian tribes.
In China, artificially preserved remains have been recovered from the Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE), but the embalming fluids and methods used are unknown. In Europe, artificial preservation became widespread by around 500 CE, known as the anatomists’ period of embalming. Early methods are documented by contemporary physicians like Peter Forestus and Ambroise Pare. The first attempts to inject the vascular system were made by Alessandra Giliani in 1326. Various attempts and procedures have been reported by Leonardo da Vinci, Jacobus Berengar, Bartholomeo Eustachius, Reinier de Graaf, Jan Swammerdam, and Frederik Ruysch.
What is the bad smell after death?
A dead human body releases around 30 chemical compounds, which emit distinct odors. Some recognizable odors include Cadaverine and putrescine, Skatole, Indole, Hydrogen sulfide, Methanethiol, and Dimethyl disulfide and trisulfide. These compounds can smell like rotting flesh, feces, eggs, cabbage, or garlic. The smell of death can damage personal belongings and a building’s structure, as fluids and odors permeate porous materials. Cleaning the scene is dangerous and should be left to a professional crime scene and trauma cleanup company. The smell of death can linger for some time, making professional help necessary.
Is the smell of death toxic?
A pungent odor often alerts people of a decomposing body after a recent death, but it is not a biohazard or a health hazard to the public. The foul odor is caused by bacteria breaking down internal organs after the natural flow of nutrients has halted due to the death. Precautions are advised when finding a deceased person on property, especially if it is a family member or loved one. First, leave the scene immediately, especially if the death was a result of a violent crime, and ensure you are away from dangers like possible perpetrators and bodily fluids. Call law enforcement and emergency medical services to locate the body.
What does a dead body smell off?
A dead body smell is caused by gas-producing bacteria in the body, which digest the body after death. These bacteria, particularly in the pancreas and intestines, release gas during digestion, which fouls the air and can cause the body to explode. The process can take 2-3 days. The smell of rotting meat with fruity undertones is influenced by various factors, including the composition of bacteria, bacterial interactions, the stage of decomposition, the climate, the deceased’s genetic makeup, and diet.
Enzymes digesting cell walls also contribute to the dead body smell. Maggots and files in the remains are attracted to the organic material decomposing, which increases the decomposition by breaking down the matter and laying eggs in the remains. Even after the dead body has been removed and the unattended death has been remediated, a lingering odor of the dead body can still be present in items made of fabric and other porous material.
What can mask the smell of a dead body?
To permanently remove decomposition odors, set a bowl of vinegar or baking soda near the cleaned area, keeping it out of reach of pets and young children. Aftermath Services is available 24/7 to help with trauma cleanups, providing discreet, compassionate, and professional technicians. A Certificate of Treatment is issued for full-scopes of work, which can be attached to the property’s bill of sale as a disinfection guarantee. After the cleanup process is complete, adenosine triphosphate (ATP) fluorescence testing is used to verify a high disinfection level, similar to the technology used by hospitals.
What kills the smell of death?
The Dead Body Odor Removal Process involves removing the source of the odor, evaluating the situation, and choosing the best odor removal techniques. One effective treatment option is using Ozone, which destroys molecules, spores, and bacteria causing the odor by reacting with smell-causing particles in the air and on surfaces. This technique covers walls, floorboards, ductwork, ceilings, cracks, and gaps in building structures. Once the treatment is complete, the property is air-dried to dispel O3 and refresh the oxygen, allowing for a safe and comfortable environment.
Does a body still smell after embalming?
Embalming is a personal choice made by family members or directions in the deceased’s will, and is typically required for public viewings or wakes. Before embalming, the body is washed in a disinfectant solution made with formaldehyde-based chemical solutions. This process removes all body fluids, reducing the smell factor. In the past, New Orleans experienced hundreds of dead bodies at a time due to yellow fever and cholera, with 1 in 15 people dying from it.
Coffins were sometimes placed in trenches and stacked on top of each other, which may have contributed to the smell. The national cremation rate is approximately 50, and there are more cemeteries than in the mid-19th century, providing more burial options. The bodies are sealed in tight behind plaster or brick and covered with a tablet made of marble or granite, making it difficult to remove smells.
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Being able to smell metal makes a lot of sense with how blood is just a very important thing to smell for anything that has it and hunts things that have it, which is an interesting thing on it’s own. The way the smell only activates when it’s mixed with your body fluids, it’s like it was made this way specifically for creatures to smell it. And you can’t even confuse it for metal because metal doesn’t smell unless you touch it.
I used to make lemon curd and whenever I made it, it inevitably had a metallic taste/smell. And because I had strained the curd through a metal sieve and somehow the acidity from the lemon probably caused some reaction and therefore my curd always ended up with a metallic taste/smell. I guess that metallic taste/smell probably was something leeching off some of the metal and chemically reacted to have similar properties of the chemical you made. Who knows. I suck at chemistry.
He made the worst smelling mixture of substances and didn’t think it was too bad. His friends/coworkers didn’t agree. People have different sensitivities but probably too many chemicals have contributed to hyposmia. I experienced complete anosmia with Covid several times. Now probably hyposmia at the right nostril. Glad I didn’t lose it all.
I am a chemist in the pharmaceutical industry. More recently I have been doing more proposals, but my graduate research was synthetic inorganic chemistry, and professionally I was more of a synthetic organic chemist. These articles are awesome, and make me miss working in a lab. It also reminds me that I miss undergrad and grad research less… I don’t think I could distill off solvent without a rotovap, and a combiflash would have been pretty awesome. It would be cool to try to reproduce the exact reaction that goes on when the oil of your skin comes in contact with metal.
I love NILE’s articles….. Even if I don’t understand all the technical-chemestry stuff exactly… But the fact that You’re presenting “everyday chemistry” in an understandable way is awesome. Here’s a request: can you do a article on possible processes to “de-alloy” metals? Like taking the tin out of brass leaving the copper behind?
Hi. Perfumer here. This is probably my absolute favorite thing about perfumery, is the chemistry. Also how everyone interprets smells differently and we all have different experiences with scent. The brain pathway that interprets what you’re smelling goes straight to the amygdala and hippocampus and directly links the fragrances to memories (IE the smell of fresh brewed coffee, fresh baked bread, the salty ocean). It’s the strongest for of memory recall we have as humans. All of the fragrances i have made are based solely on memories and experiences i have had. Love seeing you make and synthesize aroma compounds i use all the time and want to use. Keep up the great work!
You could synthesize cis-3-hexenyl cyclopropane carboxylate, the smell of Rainforest 😀 (according to the German Wikipedia, article: Cyclopropancarbonsäure) Condensation of 1,2-dibromoethane with diethylmalonate, followed by simultaneous decarboxylation and ester hydrolysis; finally esterification with cis-3-hexenol. 😉
i have very little to no sense of smell, which at first totally kills taste in pretty much everything. after a few years taste gets more nuanced and you get to find that stuff that doesn’t smell, like metals, do taste like stuff. for my work i deal a lot with different and somewhat exotic alloys, and especially aluminium alloys can be distinct in taste. mostly because aluminium by itself taste mostly of spiky sand, so metals like zinc and copper can still be made out. Iron tastes very heavily like blood, which seems to be a hard wired alarm taste so it overrules a lot, except for lead, which is so sweet it can overpower iron.
Holy crap in my opinion this is seriously one of the coolest articles of yours! I work with metal all day and I’m starting to study organic chemistry in my spare time and this blew my mind. When your friends immediately said it smelled like metal that must have felt good, instant verification! I’m always going to think about 1-octen-3-one when I touch metal now. 🙂 You inspire me so much, I hope you know how much your articles mean to me, and as soon as I can I will buy your merch and support you on patreon. 🙂
How chemistry differs in your life and in science is so fun, like: How do you get metal smell naturally: touch it with your skin and hey here’s that funny smell How do scientists get metal smell: so we need like a week to make pure 1-octen-3-one from closest chemical and it still smells like mushrooms and not metal
Cool article. You might have used a mildly acidic aqueous extraction in the beginning in order to remove the TEA. I’m surprised you didn’t get too much polymerization or even Michael additions into the enone. One thing you can do to help avoid unwanted polymerizations is add a tiny bit of BHT (Butylated hydroxytoluene) to your distillation flask. This is a radical inhibitor which can help suppress unwanted polymerization. Finally, while IR is okay for fingerprinting the material, if you really want to get an idea of the purity, I would highly recommend NMR if you can find someone to run it for you! Depending on the nature of future experiments, I could probably help you out there! 🙂
This was very interesting, I’ve been working with metal almost sixty years, since a small child, melting lead, then zinc, brass, silver and on up, and I well remember the smell, but I don’t smell it anymore. I’ve had my own machine shop for thirty years, and I suspect I’m so used to it’s smell, and the tons of all different ionic metals, is just “over loaded” or some such thing. I always thought it was a galvanic reaction caused by the salts in our skin, but this is far more interesting. Thanks, John McClain
When I was a kid, we had a cast iron stairwell guard that was huge, spanning the whole flight of stairs and a mezzanine at the second story. The smell of iron was overwhelmingly strong and similar to my blood when I’ve been eating plenty of kale, greens, etc. And it smells distinctly different from nickels, which smell different than pennies.
Rotovap allows you to remove solvent at a lower temperature by using vacuum, so that no heat can potentially alter your final product. You might want to get one when doing something more sophisticated. (Or perhaps you can somehow couple vacuum with your distillation device. Oh wait you already did…)
1) Why did youtube decided to serve me with a chemistry article? 2) I like this chemistry article. I mean last time that I had anything to do with chemistry was in middle school and after that I had more important tings to do but this was interesting. 3) I never realized that chemistry was such an complex affair. 4) This answers so many things from my childhood.
Hi, thanks for your amazing work, you solved one of the questions that always bugged me. If you are looking for an idea for another article more or less related, I would really like to know what makes some people’s sweat “corrosive” while others don’t have this problem. I work in the manufacturing sector and many companies add in their recruitment procedure a sweat test (commonly touching a polished, clean steel sample) to avoir recruiting people that have a tendency to oxydize parts. I for example can touch metal parts for months without leaving any oxydized fingerpring marks while my coworker has literally the most corrosive sweat I ever saw, if he touches a sample you can be sure that 48h later the part will be oxydized. I think there might be different sources to investigate there, sweat salts concentration linked to the amount of water consumed and type of food consumed but also the tendency of a person to have a dry skin or sweat from their hands. At least that’s what I have been guessing but it would be so cool if you could investigate the matter in a more scientific approach. Thanks a lot and continue the good work.
The Belousov-Zhabotinsky reaction is cool. I remember once walking into an empty classroom before a Mathematics class, and the previous (chemistry) lecturer had written the equation incorrectly on the board. I hadn’t recently studied it, though; I just worked it out in my head and fixed it on the chalkboard. I was quite proud of myself.
I’m in the first ten seconds of the article. I’ve played my guitar for years and I don’t smell the regular metal smell. After playing, my fingers smell like fresh chopped garlic. I’ve showed friends and they agree. Is there a chemical reason?, like my skin oils and the metal reacting? I’ll watch the rest of the vid, I was just excited to hear about guitar finger smell. Thanks, friend.
Worked in machine shops cutting all kinds of metals for over 20 years. I’m nose blind to that smell of vaporized coolant being in there nearly everyday but that smell hits me like truck after a few weeks off, its horrible for the first hour or two! Perhaps the worst metal to work with in terms of any smell is cutting cast iron without sufficient coolant, as this gives off small enough particles that it can float in the air so you can inhale some. Pick your nose after a shift and its grey/black, distinctive smell but whether its cast iron I’m smelling or graphite/something else that’s added to the cast at the foundry I do not know! Special mention to the welders I used to work with who welded galvanized steel tubes for poly tunnels, that stinks and I’m sure was defo poisionious!
As a child I could distinguish copper from brass, or steel easily by taste. And steel had a smell I called green because it was like vegetable matter. Nickel steels were particularly “green scented”. When I learned, as a teen, that metals could not be smelled, my new theory was that metals actually alter the air composition near them by catalysis. And this change was what I was smelling.
Now I get the process used to make this metallic like smell. But what really gets me is that I’ve observed is some metals give of different smells than others. For example: Grade 55 steel does provide the same smell as stainless steel and Aluminum doesn’t give off the same sent as Aluminum, while galvanized steel smells entirely separate along with Iron and cast Iron. I’d like to hear thoughts on this one, because it’s a bit baffling to fellow metal workers as well.
Thanks. I was a little kid that was always smelling things, that would bother me a lot, and I was always told “We can’t smell anything, forget it”. I developed a serious hand-washing habit, trying to rid myself of things that had somehow “contaminated” me. It was bad enough that I started avoiding using doorknobs and handrails, and stopped using the swings on the playground, not wanting to get that “metal” smell on my hands. I’m glad other people can smell this, I’m not crazy, just a PITA.
I’m a plumber, I work with copper, brass, steel and stainless steel all the time. There is a smell I associate with metal, but realistically it is the smell of the oils present on metal products. Except for copper, there is a smell specific to working with copper. It gets on your hands, it lingers. Probably? It’s the smell of copper oxides mixed with soldering flux, but it is distinct.
6:58 That seems like a pretty likely mechanism. Chloride is a good leaving group and phosphorous, in general, forms VERY strong bonds with oxygen atoms. The strength of P-O bonds drives one of the more interesting organic reactions they teach you in school: The Wittig reaction. Also side note, technically 1-octen-3-ol is pronounced “one octeen three all” as it stems from the IUPAC name octene.
There’s some times I know of where metal stinks without human oils. There are steel tables at work, we use gloves, but when it’s sanitized with alcohol there’s a metal stink, the second one I know of, its the one I hate more and it’s guaranteed to be just metal. It’s when construction workers cuts or wealds metal. The burnt metal smell is very strong. Another one is when water pulls minerals out of the ground, though water full of copper smells different than copper pennies
Ok, this may explain the “scent of metal”, but what about metallic taste/s? There’s also the distinctive smell of burning metal (which I’ve most often encountered when cutting steel alloy H-beams with an angle grinder). Smells are processed in one of the oldest & most primal areas of the human brain. Scent memories can exceedingly potent – especially when associated with an emotional state – h meaning that even a tiny quantity of a scent producing molecule, may trigger a very potent recollection of an emotional event.
You can smell the different oxites on the money, or dirt from hands, depending on currency and how sweaty your hands are. Everything metal leaves a smell on your hand (every doorknob/handle), everything that is not surface-prepared will leave a smell or taste. Combining different metals can change the taste due to current flowing through the toung to the other metal and so on. Try it out, smell at your hand after handling one or more doors, or “change” as you call metal money. And better wash you hands from know on, after touching money or doorhandles.
I know exactly that smell! I was blessed/cursed with have a gas chromatography machine as a nose. I can smell the kind of metal and even if it was a man or a woman who touched it last. Blood smells very similar to iron but there are some other smells too (probably various hormones and microbial byproducts from the blood coming out and oxidizing). The theory that our ability to distinctly detect this smell as almost certainly the smell of blood is a good one as it would have aided us when we were small and often prey to larger animals and now that we are the most dangerous animals on this planet. Good observation! This has to be my favorite article so far.
The only smell I have ever associated with metal is when I open a box of nails. To me, a box of nails somewhat smells like very weak mild chlorine. Besides metal, I can walk into any building, house, apartment and structure and tell if the place has a roach infestation or if the place has absolutely no roaches. I’ve casually asked many people if they know what roach infestations smells like. Not only everyone I asked said no, but they also are not aware that a roach infestation does have a unique smell. Maybe I can smell it better than most people. To me, a roach infestation smells like a combination of honey, sulfur and unscented baby powder all blended together, and it’s mildly irritating. If I’m looking to rent a place, walk into a hotel lobby to check in (so on) and I smell that scent, it’s an immediate automatic no for me. The powderier and irritating the smell is, the stronger infestation, even if you don’t physically see them, and you won’t see them at first. If I don’t smell it at all, then the place is good to rent, and the hotel is good for checking in.
I am not a practicing chemist, however it occurs to me that maybe this stuff could be synthesized more quickly and with a potentially higher yield. Given that iron, copper, and zinc catalyze this reaction in a perhaps selective manner: take a piece of fine brass wool and fill a glass tube with it, use a constant current supply to gently heat the brass wool and use the slightly changing voltage across it to measure the temperature of the brass wool (reaction chamber). Pull a partial vacuum on that with the remainder being wet air (you need a source of oxidation for the metal catalyzed reaction, use wet air?). Use another glass tube and a magnet driven pump (stir bar with aerofoils on a bearing with a magnetic drive on the outside) to provide a flow of nitrogen through the reaction chamber (recirculating loop for the gas flow). On the output end of the reaction chamber, add a cooled metal container (old cleaned out hardware store container of solvent) with more brass wool for cooling surface area as the receiving flask and a Peltier element and heat sink to provide it with fast cooling. On the input end of the reaction chamber, spray in the pure 1-octen-3-ol, stoichiometric amounts of oxygen and water directly onto the brass wool. With the proper temperature control, flow rate, and reaction vessel length; this may likely produce reasonably pure 1-octen-3-one with no hard to get reactants in a quick and scalable way.
I gotta say, working in powdered metal i’m not so sure i agree with your statement that, “metals have no smell”. Powdered metal is very very fine microscopic particles, but, it’s very pungent. It smells like most other metals like copper steel or nickel, ect. and this goes for any powdered metal that has never been touched by a human. They have a very distinct pungent odor. I’d love to see you do this experiment with powdered metal!!
Mercury does have a “smell”, if you’re sensitive or allergic to it. After all, the vapor reacts with organic molecules in your nose’s mucosa. And then there is the kind of reactions metal oxides catalyze, that lead to smelly reaction product. And last not least: Volatile metal oxides (again reactions occurring from contact of these oxides with organic tissue in your nose) such as osmium tetroxide.