Aromatherapy and pheromones

Women who live in the same place tend to synchronize their menstrual periods. Some scientists suggest this is due to the minuscule particles of body pheromones in the environment. These aromatic molecules - unconsciously imperceptible by the human being- are detected by the smell sense, that fall in the physiological processes of women.

Female rats do not get pregnant if they do not detect the smell of the male rat. This explains why that some essential oils as the damson rose had cause human infertility cases that had no organic origin.

Aromatherapy, emotions and nervous system In addition to physical reactions, an aroma can also affect the nervous system and produce emotional responses in the human being. Numerous scientific studies point out the relationship between memory and smell. Memory is strongly activated by aromas.

Most of use have experimented smells that wake up in us distant memories, good and bad memories. Aromas stimulate emotional centers of our brain. These centers have the capacity of storing memories, independently of other parts of the body, and here is where the use of aromatherapy can play an important role at a neurological level, since it would help people with brain damage to revive previous experiences and would even stimulate the brain to develop new neuronal connexions.

Scientific investigations have detected changes in the brain waves during sleep, caused by the introduction of an aroma. They have realized experiments, where the pure essential oils were administrated in low dosages, where the participants declared they “could not smell” them. However, the brain waves changed, indicating that the aromatic molecules were detected by the smell.

Science proves everyday that the bloodstream through the respiratory tract, in direct or indirect inhalations, baths and ambient diffusions, absorbs the components of pure essential oils.

This has a pharmacological action fort he absorption of chemical products through the respiratory way (one aromatic molecule can pass through a respiratory membrane) and may have an indirect effect, but still powerful, over the brain by means of smell perception (an identical molecule can activate a sensorial receptor in the nasal mucosa and produce psychological effects).