A team of Japanese scientists have just shown that the smell of lemon, orange, basil, mango, lavender, cinnamon and other fragrances of plant origin modifies the activity of genes and blood chemistry in such a way that stress levels are reduced. Their findings are published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry .
According to researcher Akio Nakamura and his colleagues in the study, humans have inhaled the aromas of plants since ancient times to try to reduce stress, fight inflammation and depression, and induce sleep. Most of the substances used for these purposes contain linalool , a terpene present in more than 200 plants. Using laboratory rats, Nakamura has shown that aspirating linalool restores the elevated levels of neutrophils and lymphocytes that accompany stress to near normal values. In addition, their research reveals that inhaling this substance reduces the activity of more than 100 genes linked to stress.
