BACKGROUND Flushing is generally considered to be the primary symptom of menopause and is typically the most common complaint in menopausal women. Although flushing poses no danger to a woman's health, it decreases the quality of life. Thus, the purpose of this study was to determine the effect of lavender aromatherapy on menopause flushing. METHODS This double-blinded crossover clinical tria...

The present study investigated whether exposure to aromas during recess periods affects work performance. Subjects comprised 36 healthy male students (mean age, 24.2 +/- 2.2 years) who were randomly divided into three groups: (1) control group, not exposed to aroma during recesses; (2) jasmine group, exposed to jasmine aroma during recesses; and (3) lavender group, exposed to lavender aroma dur...

The objective of this study is to determine the effects of 12 weeks of lavender aromatherapy on self-reported sleep and heart rate variability (HRV) in the midlife women with insomnia. Sixty-seven women aged 45-55 years, with a CPSQI (Chinese version of Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index) greater than 5, were recruited from communities in Taiwan. The experimental group (n = 34) received lavender in...

BACKGROUND Surgery, as a treatment, is a stressful experience. The anxiety is more severe in open-heart surgery patients due to its risk and complications. The present study aimed to determine the effect of lavender essence on the levels of anxiety and blood cortisol in candidates for open-heart surgery. MATERIALS AND METHODS This was a single-blind clinical trial, a random allocation study w...

Spike lavender (Lavandula latifolia) is an aromatic shrub cultivated worldwide for the production of essential oils. The major constituents of these oils are monoterpenes, which are obtained from isopentenyl diphosphate and dimethylallyl diphosphate precursors through the plastidial methylerythritol phosphate (MEP) pathway and/or the cytosolic mevalonate pathway. 1-Deoxy-D-xylulose-5-P synthase...

Symbiotic microbes can benefit their animal hosts by enhancing the diversity of communication signals available to them. The fermentation hypothesis for chemical recognition posits that 1) fermentative bacteria in specialized mammalian scent glands generate odorants that mammals co-opt to communicate with one another, and 2) that variation in scent gland odors is due to underlying variation in ...

Numerous behavioral studies have shown that animals use olfactory cues as inbreeding avoidance or kin avoidance mechanisms, implying that scent is unique to families. However, few studies have analyzed the chemical profile of a scent and ascertained the messages that are conveyed in scent secretions. Owl monkeys (Aotus nancymaae) are socially monogamous primates that utilize scent when interact...

Aromatase cytochrome P450 (P450arom) is an enzyme that catalyzes the conversion of androgen to estrogen. Expression of P450arom in extra-gonadal sites and locally-synthesized estrogen play an important role in physiological conditions. The purpose of this study was to investigate the cellular immunolocalization of androgen receptor (AR), P450arom, estrogen receptor alpha (ERa) and estrogen rece...

We report the results of a 31-day trial on the effects of chocolate scent on purchasing behavior in a bookstore. Our study replicates and extends a 10-day randomized controlled trial in order to examine the generalizability of the original finding. We first introduce the study of store atmospherics and highlight the importance and dearth of replication in this area. In the next section, we desc...

This study evaluates the effect of the interaction between cognitive variables and the presence of scent on online search motivation, purchase characteristics, and telepresence. An interaction between consumers’ type of thought process and the presence of scent was identified as influencing search motivation (attention focus and challenge) and telepresence experience. Ambient scent influenced t...