A team at Beihang University in China is looking to add smell to VR experiences by creating an odour generator to produce specific smells during virtual experiences.
The team created two different versions of the 'olfaction interface'.
The first is a skin-integrated device, which sees users stick a patch of 'skin' between their nose and mouth, the second version is placed on the face like a traditional face mask.
The interfaces contain odour generators in the form of miniaturised containers of paraffin wax infused with different scents. These can activate individually or be combined to create smells (the face mask offers 9 odour generators, while the on-skin version has 2).
The scents reach the device’s wearer via an actuator and heat source that starts to melt the wax, causing it to release its scent, like a candle. The researchers claim it only takes 1.44 seconds for a scent to be generated and reach the device wearer’s nose. To make the scent stop or transition to a different one, a copper coil kicks a magnet to cover the wax and cool it down.
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