Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Questions for the New Emperor of Scent

Yesterday we broke the story of a new vibrational theory of olfaction that threatens to eclipse Luca Turin’s. If there’s going to be a new Emperor of Scent, people will want to know more about him. To satisfy everyone’s curiosity we invited Thomas Prevenslik to take part in an FN Interview. Here is the list of questions we sent him.

FN: When and why did you start thinking about quantum electrodynamics (QED) and olfactory receptors?

FN: Have you ever smelled deuterated benzaldehydes? Were they what you expected?

FN: How many languages do you speak or read?

FN: Would you agree that Or Black by Pascal Morabito is “an extreme fougère, smoky, dark, bitter, resinous-green, like triple-distilled Earl Grey, a step beyond even Rive Gauche pour Homme in its saturnine glory”?

FN: How convincing did you find the 2007 paper by Brookes et al. on olfactory receptor activation by inelastic electron tunneling? Did it motivate your new thinking on QED and smell?

FN: Who would you rather have formulate your personal cologne: Annick Ménardo, Bertrand Duchaufour, Yohji Yamamoto, or Jean-Claude Ellena?

FN: Have you found it difficult to publish your new vibrational theory of olfaction in peer-reviewed scientific journals? Do you think there is an effort to silence vibration theorists?

FN: Is the 1981 Château Lamothe Despujols really all it’s cracked up to be? What’s your favorite Sauternes?

FN: Has a tall, socially awkward guy been following you around taking notes? If not, why not?

1 comment:

~x~ said...

did you "pick up" physics on the fly while perusing vintage boutiques?