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

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  Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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  Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should Know
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  Speaker 1: from House Stuff Works dot Com. Hi, and welcome to
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  Speaker 1: the podcast. My name's Josh. The guy across from his
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  Speaker 1: name's Chuck. Say Hi, Chuck, Hi, how are you hey? Chuck?
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  Speaker 1: You know, I was reading an article today and basically
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  Speaker 1: they've recently found out that air pollution, as if it
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  Speaker 1: weren't bad enough for your lungs, it actually interferes with
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  Speaker 1: your heart's electrical activity. You're kidding, No, No, I would
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  Speaker 1: not kid about that, Chuck. I take the hearts electrical
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  Speaker 1: activity very seriously. Yeah. So, um, basically, our bodies can
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  Speaker 1: kind of get rid of particles. Then there's fine particles,
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  Speaker 1: which are a little more difficult. Now we have something
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  Speaker 1: called ultra fine particles sub microscopic. They basically get into
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  Speaker 1: your body and just read all manner of havoc. And
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  Speaker 1: as far as I know, we weren't aware that it
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  Speaker 1: really interfered with any process of the heart up to
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  Speaker 1: this point. But yeah, basically, um, I think it was
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  Speaker 1: the Journal of the American Heart Association where this study
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  Speaker 1: was published, and when somebody undergoes some sort of heart surgery,
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  Speaker 1: that kind of thing, they recommend that they avoid traffic anyway, right,
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  Speaker 1: for stress levels. And yeah, because you know how upset
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  Speaker 1: you get in traffic. I've seen you don't. Don't pretend
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  Speaker 1: like you don't know. I take the subway, bro, I'm
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  Speaker 1: I'm traffic free, right, And why do you take the subway?
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  Speaker 1: Because traffic makes me crazy? Precisely so, they used to
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  Speaker 1: recommend that that heart patients stay away from traffic for
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  Speaker 1: two to three weeks after getting back from the hospital,
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  Speaker 1: and they still do, but now for this other reason,
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  Speaker 1: because you know, all this traffic pollution can interfere with
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  Speaker 1: your heart's electrical activity. Is this only big cities or
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  Speaker 1: is it across the board? Across the board, I would imagine,
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  Speaker 1: because I mean, if you're if you have your window
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  Speaker 1: rolled down and you're in any kind of traffic, you're
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  Speaker 1: just sucking that stuff. Course. And now some places are
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  Speaker 1: worse than others. I know one place where they would
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  Speaker 1: recommend you not drive after Where Where would that be? China? China? Yes,
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  Speaker 1: pretty much anywhere in China. There are some rural parts
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  Speaker 1: of China that are pretty clean. You know, lots of trees,
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  Speaker 1: that kind of thing. But just about any city in
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  Speaker 1: China is going to have a pretty high level pollution
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  Speaker 1: as a matter of fact, as far as I know.
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  Speaker 1: In two thousand and six, the World Bank Fine Bank
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  Speaker 1: UH conducted a survey of the twenty most polluted cities
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  Speaker 1: in the world. This is amazing to me. Sixteen of
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  Speaker 1: the twenty we're in China. I know that's four fifths, right, Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: that's four fifths by my math. That sounds good. That
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  Speaker 1: is a lot. So I don't know if Beijing fell
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  Speaker 1: off of that because they China pulled out all the
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  Speaker 1: stops to keep Beijing's pollution down. During the Olympics, well,
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  Speaker 1: I know, I remember watching I believe some was it cyclists,
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  Speaker 1: US cyclists that kind of caused a little bit of
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  Speaker 1: a stir when they showed up in Beijing wearing masks,
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  Speaker 1: breathing masks. I hadn't seen that. I know that all
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  Speaker 1: manner of athletes were saying that they may not go
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  Speaker 1: compete in Beijing because they took very seriously the damage
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  Speaker 1: it was going to do to their bodies. Yeah, they
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  Speaker 1: were walking around wearing masks, and a lot of people
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  Speaker 1: were pretty upset about that. Yeah, well, I mean, how
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  Speaker 1: can you play I've seen pictures. I've never been to Beijing,
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  Speaker 1: but unless these photos were retouched, it was it was
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  Speaker 1: pretty serious stuff. Well I think I know where this
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  Speaker 1: is leading. Yeah, I think you do too, because you know,
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  Speaker 1: we planned it out ourselves. Pollution sniffing, right. Um, there
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  Speaker 1: was a group that was assembled and as far as
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  Speaker 1: I know, they weren't assembled specifically for the Olympics. I
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  Speaker 1: don't think they've been disbanded. I guess is what I
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  Speaker 1: mean that the Olympics are over um to walk around
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  Speaker 1: a province in China, uh, the Guandong province. Please forgive
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  Speaker 1: me any anyone of Chinese ancestry or from China for
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  Speaker 1: that terrible, terrible pronunciation. But they walk around the Guandong
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  Speaker 1: province and sniff out air pollution and they're trained to
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  Speaker 1: do something, very highly trained. Actually, yeah, it's it's it's
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  Speaker 1: kind of an unbelievable thing, but it's really true. It
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  Speaker 1: is true. It is true. Again, I've never met any
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  Speaker 1: of these people, but I can tell you from all
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  Speaker 1: reports this is this is a real thing. Um. Basically,
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  Speaker 1: they took they took a group of I guess, above
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  Speaker 1: average smellers. I imagine that they're probably not smokers. There
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  Speaker 1: was some requisition, um, and they took them into this
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  Speaker 1: this laboratory and had them sniff different noxious smells to
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  Speaker 1: train their senses. Right yeah, yeah, but they did it
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  Speaker 1: very intensively. And there's actually a study um that came
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  Speaker 1: out of I think Northwestern UH that showed that the
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  Speaker 1: more you sniff a certain smell, the more of an
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  Speaker 1: expert you becoming in right, you can hone in and
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  Speaker 1: get more specific with it, because much more complex. So
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  Speaker 1: I mean, for example, if you smell a flower, a
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  Speaker 1: certain flower, first time you smell it, you've created a
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  Speaker 1: it's been codd there's a there's a sense memory in
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  Speaker 1: your brain memory and um, anytime you see at that
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  Speaker 1: kind of flower, that set membory is probably going to
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  Speaker 1: be triggered. So you'll be getting this visual information like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: there's that flower, and this is what it smells like.
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  Speaker 1: You know. Um, So once it becomes coated, it's there.
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  Speaker 1: But it can the complexity of our idea of what
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  Speaker 1: the thing smells like can be expanded and and subtracted
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  Speaker 1: from as far as the more he's fine. Sure, So
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  Speaker 1: this generally happens over time, Like you smell the flower
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  Speaker 1: once in a while, and you know with the China
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  Speaker 1: pollution sniffers. Uh, this was a very intensive training period.
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  Speaker 1: It was over and over again, smell the sulfur. Smell
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  Speaker 1: the sulfur. You have no choice, back of the net,
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  Speaker 1: kind of sac blocked in a room smelling these things.
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  Speaker 1: And it's not a pleasant task. And they even are
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  Speaker 1: on records it's saying that it is no fun. But
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  Speaker 1: because they were also trained to smell harmless smells as
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  Speaker 1: well noxious like like terribly offensive odors, but ones that
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  Speaker 1: weren't necessarily harmful. So aparently these people were trained to
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  Speaker 1: walk past any you know, garbage dump or smoke stack
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  Speaker 1: and go, you know, there's X amount of sulfur in there,
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  Speaker 1: and I smell a little black carbon and maybe some
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  Speaker 1: dog poop. That's not that bad, but it's in there.
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  Speaker 1: Sure maybe so maybe so spring roll to say the least. So. Uh.
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  Speaker 1: The one thing I never figured out was why I
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  Speaker 1: got the who, the how, the wind, the what. I
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  Speaker 1: never figured out the why Why would you train people
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  Speaker 1: to smell? Well, I would think because they could pinpoint,
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  Speaker 1: you know, pollution and do something about it. Or is
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  Speaker 1: that not the case. Well, we we could anyway with
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  Speaker 1: electronic sensors. Are you talking about the NASA device that's
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  Speaker 1: one of many. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty
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  Speaker 1: sure if you want, I've got car keys. I know
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  Speaker 1: you took the train, But we could go to radio
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  Speaker 1: shack right now, and I'm pretty sure we could probably
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  Speaker 1: find some sort of old factory sensing device, an electronic
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  Speaker 1: version of it check probably if it were a good
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  Speaker 1: radio check. It would depend on the location. Um, but
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  Speaker 1: I don't understand, like why you would train humans to
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  Speaker 1: do this. The the one clear point is you can
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  Speaker 1: send the radio check or the NASA old factory sensor
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  Speaker 1: out and it will report back. You know, there's this
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  Speaker 1: many parts per million of you know, carbon dioxide or
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  Speaker 1: sulfur or whatever in the air, but it's not gonna
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  Speaker 1: have any reaction a human would. So it's the human
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  Speaker 1: would be like, you know, oh, there's sulfur dioxide and
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  Speaker 1: I'm dying, which is really the one real drawback with
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  Speaker 1: the pollution. Exactly when you have humans doing this, it
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  Speaker 1: takes its toll on you know, not only their senses
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  Speaker 1: but their health. So it does make you wonder why
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  Speaker 1: they would send people in there. Precisely, and you never
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  Speaker 1: found out. No, I never had a clue and as
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  Speaker 1: a matter of fact, it was never spoken of in
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  Speaker 1: any of the articles I read when I was researching this.
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  Speaker 1: But um, it seemed to me the big elephant in
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  Speaker 1: the room, like these people are going to die horrible
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  Speaker 1: debts in the next few years. Well, and also there
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  Speaker 1: that seems like their smell would deteriorate or at least
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  Speaker 1: be you know, neutralized or something over time. Yeah, but
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  Speaker 1: they're they're recertified every three years. The schedule was every
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  Speaker 1: three years they would be re certified. So I guess
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  Speaker 1: that kind of shows that they weren't going to be
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  Speaker 1: disbanded after the Olympics. Um, because the the olfactory sense
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  Speaker 1: does deteriorate over time. But the exposure to these harmful chemicals,
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  Speaker 1: especially in the training uh seminar or segment of the
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  Speaker 1: of the the whole pollution sniffing academy, UM, I would
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  Speaker 1: think would really pose a serious health risk, right. I
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  Speaker 1: would think they would use that, you know, we're talking
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  Speaker 1: about the NASA thing and then to go the ENOS
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  Speaker 1: is what they call it. It was just a cute
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  Speaker 1: and of course is that love that name? And uh,
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  Speaker 1: they'd use that on the space Shuttle right to detect
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  Speaker 1: ammonia leaks, which makes a lot of sense that they
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  Speaker 1: wouldn't send a human up in the space shuttle to
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  Speaker 1: you know, sniff for money. It seems like it's around
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  Speaker 1: is or her next thing like ammonia sniffer or I
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  Speaker 1: break for ammonia right the well, the other the other
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  Speaker 1: argument against that, aside from you know, that being a
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  Speaker 1: suicide mission, is that a human just can't smell it
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  Speaker 1: as as well as this enos can um. You know,
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  Speaker 1: we can get you know, X number of parts per million.
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  Speaker 1: Let's say, you know, several hundred parts per million before
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  Speaker 1: we realize, oh, there's ammonia leak and I'm dead. This
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  Speaker 1: enos can sniff something like I think one part per million,
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  Speaker 1: one part per million, you're right, So it knows the
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  Speaker 1: ammonia leak is going on long before any human has
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  Speaker 1: even sniffed ammonia. You know how noxious and smelling ammonia is.
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  Speaker 1: So that's that's the purpose of the enos and it
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  Speaker 1: goes on. It's equally impressive um down here on Earth.
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  Speaker 1: It can tell the difference between coke and pepsi. That's
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  Speaker 1: so awesome, and not not by tasting obviously, no no, no,
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  Speaker 1: just by smelling, just by smelling, and the other one, Uh,
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  Speaker 1: it can sense it can it can sniff an electrical
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  Speaker 1: fire before the fire actually breaks out. Yeah, so so
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  Speaker 1: the Jet Propulsion Laboratories EENOS is a very valuable item
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  Speaker 1: to have on board when you're in space. Well, one
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  Speaker 1: thing I found interesting Joshua was reading this was the
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  Speaker 1: way smell works is is sort of like the way
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  Speaker 1: taste works. Yeah, we don't know, and I know we've
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  Speaker 1: talked about that. Well, I'm talking about specifically the shape
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  Speaker 1: of the smell receptors and taste receptors. Well, that's a
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  Speaker 1: that's the theory. They have the same theory for how
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  Speaker 1: we taste and how we smell. But they both boiled
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  Speaker 1: down to the fact that their their theories. We don't
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  Speaker 1: know for certain exactly what's going on. These are these
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  Speaker 1: are pretty good theories. You want to you want to
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  Speaker 1: tell them about the the receptor idea, Well, it's it's
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  Speaker 1: about the the shape, like a certain smell will fit
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  Speaker 1: a certain shape for the in the in the old
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  Speaker 1: factory bundle. Is that what it's called, Yes, the old
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  Speaker 1: factory nerve. Right, Well, these are receptors at the end,
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  Speaker 1: they're all specialized exactly, but not too specialized, because one
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  Speaker 1: thing it's found really interesting was that some of the molecules,
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  Speaker 1: the shape and structure, have completely different smells right there.
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  Speaker 1: That you can have two molecules that have the same shape,
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  Speaker 1: same structure, you can't tell anything any difference between them,
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  Speaker 1: but they have but they register as different smells, which
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  Speaker 1: kind of shoots a hole in the I think it's
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  Speaker 1: called the lock and key theory, which they have for
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  Speaker 1: tastes as well. Uh, certain certain molecules unlock a certain receptor, right, Um,
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  Speaker 1: so we've got the same thing for taste and in
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  Speaker 1: the same thing for smell, and they're both equally shoddy theories,
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  Speaker 1: although they're they're they're predominantly accepted theories. Right. But if
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  Speaker 1: if the smell molecules can be the same, if they
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  Speaker 1: can double up, does that explain things like maybe if
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  Speaker 1: your fart smells like lasagna. I think if your fart
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  Speaker 1: smells like lasagna, you may have some sort of synesthesia.
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  Speaker 1: I'm not entirely certain, but you may want to consult
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  Speaker 1: a physician if your fart smell like lasagna. I wasn't
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  Speaker 1: speaking personally, I just use as an example. That's okay, chuck, okay, okay.
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  Speaker 1: So um yeah, I think you have different different receptors
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  Speaker 1: can be assaulted at the same time to produce a combination. Um,
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  Speaker 1: much like jellybellies. You know have you have you ever
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  Speaker 1: eaten jellybelly? Jelly beans? I'm not a jelly bean guy.
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  Speaker 1: These things are not jelly beans alright. Anyway, if you
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  Speaker 1: get a bag of it on the back, it says like,
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  Speaker 1: you know too, blueberry plus one. I think toasted marshmallow
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  Speaker 1: creates like the flavor of like a blueberry muffin. So
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  Speaker 1: there's different recipes. Come up with your own. It's very fun.
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  Speaker 1: Are these the ones that are kind of nasty too?
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  Speaker 1: Like they have booger and across? I think you're confusing
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  Speaker 1: a Harry Potter with reality again. Well, um, maybe I am.
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  Speaker 1: They don't. I don't know, maybe they If anybody has
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  Speaker 1: hallapeno flavored jelly beans, it would probably be jellybelly. Um.
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  Speaker 1: But they they're they're generally pretty good. They have some
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  Speaker 1: pretty good ones, although they do have some that are
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  Speaker 1: non traditional, like coffee cappuccino and well, maybe we should
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  Speaker 1: send some of these to our pollution sniffing friends in China.
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  Speaker 1: Oh they could tell the difference, I guarantee. Yeah, so
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  Speaker 1: you got everything you got that, you got the pollution
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  Speaker 1: sniffers down. Yeah. I feel sorry for these guys. It's
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  Speaker 1: done something a great job. They volunteered, Yes, they volunteered.
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  Speaker 1: No one pressed them into service. Gereman now is long
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  Speaker 1: long dead and so yes, and they are paid probably
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  Speaker 1: pretty well, so don't feel too terribly bad. They're doing
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  Speaker 1: this on their own accord, and they're helping, you know,
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  Speaker 1: the people in Guangdong Province by keeping them from harm rightfully.
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  Speaker 1: So yeah, we sold me good. And you can learn
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