Making scents: could AI help perfumers take pressure off endangered plants?
Firms working on reproducing compounds without need for repeated harvesting but conservationists are sceptical
TL;DR
- Advances in AI and biotechnology could allow the fragrance industry to reproduce scents from endangered plants without harvesting them.
- Osmo, a Google Brain spin-off, uses AI to predict and recreate smells by analyzing samples and reconstructing chemical formulas.
- BioHarvest Sciences is creating cell cultures from endangered fragrance plants to produce valuable compounds without harvesting.
- Conservationists like Mandy Aftel and Rhian Smith are skeptical, calling these claims 'greenwashing' and stating that synthetic versions do not save the plants.
- Synthetic perfume ingredients have been used for over a century, but AI's ability to predict how new molecular combinations will smell is a recent development.
- Other methods include reconstructing genes from extinct flowers and collecting microbes from clouds to create new scents.
- The complexity of natural scents, influenced by numerous molecules and environmental factors, means perfect replication remains a challenge.