Dr. Noam Sobel: How Smells Influence Our Hormones, Health & Behavior | Huberman Lab Podcast

In this episode, my guest is Noam Sobel, PhD, professor of neurobiology in the department of brain sciences at the Weizmann Institute of Science. Dr. Sobel explains his lab’s research on the biological mechanisms of smell (“olfaction”) and how sensing odorants and chemicals in our environment impacts human behavior, cognition, social connections, and hormones. He explains how smell is a crucial component of “social sensing” and how we use olfaction when meeting new people to determine things about their physiology and psychology, and he explains how this impacts friendships and romantic partners. He explains how smell influences emotions, hormone levels, memories and the relationship between breathing and autonomic homeostasis. He describes how smell-based screening tests can aid disease diagnosis and explains his lab’s work on digitization of smell — which may soon allow online communication to include “sending of odors” via the internet. Dr. Sobel’s work illustrates how sensitive human olfaction is and how it drives much of our biology and behavior. #HubermanLab #Science #Smell Thank you to our sponsors AG1 (Athletic Greens): ROKA: Thesis: Helix Sleep: InsideTracker: Supplements from Momentous Huberman Lab Social & Website Instagram: Twitter: Facebook: LinkedIn: Website: Newsletter: Dr. Noam Sobel Lab website: Lab Facebook: Publications: Twitter: Articles The Age of Olfactory Bulb Neurons in Humans: The Privileged Brain Representation of First Olfactory Associations: Mechanisms of scent-tracking in humans: Measuring and Characterizing the Human Nasal Cycle: Human non-olfactory cognition phase-locked with inhalation: A social chemosignaling function for human handshaking: There is chemistry in social chemistry: MHC-dependent mate preferences in humans: An Exteroceptive Block to Pregnancy in the Mouse: Fear-Related Chemosignals Modulate Recognition of Fear in Ambiguous Facial Expressions: Sniffing the human body volatile hexadecanal blocks aggression in men but triggers aggression in women: Menstrual Synchrony and Suppression: Regulation of ovulation by human pheromones: Human Tears Contain a Chemosignal: Why Only Humans Shed Emotional Tears: Revisiting the revisit: added evidence for a social chemosignal in human emotional tears: Increase of tear volume in dogs after reunion with owners is mediated by oxytocin: An olfactory self-test effectively screens for COVID-19: Other Resources Joachim Löw video: Osmo: Odor Space: Timestamps 00:00:00 Dr. Noam Sobel 00:03:46 Sponsors: ROKA, Thesis, Helix Sleep 00:06:46 Olfaction Circuits (Smell) 00:14:49 Loss & Regeneration of Smell, Illness 00:21:39 Brain Processing of Smell 00:24:40 Smell & Memories 00:27:52 Sponsor: AG1 (Athletic Greens) 00:29:07 Humans & Odor Tracking 00:39:25 The Alternating Nasal Cycle & Autonomic Nervous System 00:48:18 Cognitive Processing & Breathing 00:54:47 Neurodegenerative Diseases & Olfaction 01:00:12 Congenital Anosmia 01:05:01 Sponsor: InsideTracker 01:06:19 Handshaking, Sharing Chemicals & Social Sensing 01:15:07 Smelling Ourselves & Smelling Others 01:22:02 Odors & Romantic Attraction 01:24:58 Vomeronasal Organ, “Bruce Effect” & Miscarriage 01:40:20 Social Chemo-Signals, Fear 01:50:26 Chemo-Signaling, Aggression & Offspring 02:03:57 Menstrual Cycle Synchronization 02:12:11 Sweat, Tears, Emotions & Testosterone 02:27:46 Science Politics 02:37:54 Food Odors & Nutritional Value 02:45:34 Human Perception & Odorant Similarity 02:52:12 Digitizing Smell, COVID-19 & Smell 03:05:50 Medical Diagnostic Future & Olfaction Digitization 03:10:55 Zero-Cost Support, YouTube Feedback, Spotify & Apple Reviews, Sponsors, Momentous, Social Media, Neural Network Newsletter Title Card Photo Credit: Mike Blabac - Disclaimer: