Behav Res Methods Instrum Comput. 1999 Nov; 31(4): 674-9.

A delivery system for olfactory stimuli.

Palmer BR, Stough C, Patterson J.

School of Biophysical Sciences and Electrical Engineering, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn, VIC, Australia.

This paper describes the design of a new method for controlling and administering olfactory stimuli--namely, the hood system. The hood system involves a stream of vaporized odor (at known concentrations) mixed with odorless air and pumped (at a constant flow rate) into an oxygen therapy hood. It is designed to be used with odorants in solution, such as essential oils, as the olfactory stimulus. The use of oxygen therapy hoods allows for the precise control of a constant concentration of odorized air over time, while allowing subjects to breathe normally. The hood system provides a natural administration of olfactory stimuli and the exact determination of the stimulus concentration. The use of this system will allow experimental conditions to be completely defined and results and replication studies to be accurately interpreted. The hood system is portable, cost effective, and constructed from readily available components. It is proposed that the hood system could be adopted to suit a wide range of olfactory research, particularly that in which the effects of chronic exposure to olfactory stimuli on cognition are examined.