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What are some of the stinkiest smells you can think of?
A pile of poo? 💩
A pair of stinky socks? 🧦
Farts? 💨
And have you ever wondered what are truly the world’s worst scents according to science?
Time to find out…
This clear liquid might look harmless, but it's packed with all the super smelly chemicals that makes poop stink – squished together in its strongest form! 🤢
So why was this substance even created?
In the 1990s, a scientist named Pamela Dalton made a super stinky stink bomb for the military’s Department of Defense using this smell.
Blue cheese might be famously smelly, but Vieux-Boulogne is even stinkier!
This soft French cheese, made by Philippe Olivier, was named the smelliest cheese in the world by scientists in 2004.
A panel of experts, including 19 people and a special smell-testing machine, found it smellier than 14 other cheeses. 🥴
It even beat Époisses de Bourgogne, a cheese so stinky it's banned on France’s trains and other public transportation!
Would you eat it?
Rafflesia arnoldii might be the largest flower in the world, but you wouldn’t want to smell it, as it is also the smelliest!
Basically, it smells like rotting meat in order to attract flies. 🪰
This giant flower can weigh up to 11 kg (24 pounds), with its thick, fleshy petals.
It doesn’t have leaves, stems, or roots and grows as a parasite inside jungle vines.
After months of growing, the flower blooms for just 1 week before it wilts away!
It may come as no surprise that the smelliest mammal is the striped skunk, whose stinky spray can be smelled from a mile away… 🦨
But the Hoatzin bird gives it some competition!
This bird lives in the Amazon, has spiky feathers, a blue face, and smells terrible. 🤮
It’s still cute though, isn’t it?
Durian, known as the ‘king of fruit’ from Southeast Asia, might look cool with its spiky shell, but… it smells super strong!
Its smell has been compared to sewage and rotting onions, which is why it’s banned in many hotels and on public transportation there.
But despite the stink, some people love it because of its sweet, custardy taste and the fact that it’s super healthy!
Can you imagine eating a durian with some Vieux-Boulogne cheese as a snack? 😝
Yes, there is a smelliest planet and it’s Uranus!
Scientists discovered that Uranus smells like rotten eggs because its atmosphere contains a gas named Hydrogen Sulfide.
This stinky planet would be one of the smelliest places to visit – if you were an astronaut, that is! 🧑🚀
If you're ever in Venezuela and smell something skunky, it might not be a skunk but the Venezuelan skunk frog!
This tiny frog, discovered in 1991, releases a super stinky smell when threatened, using the same smelly chemical that skunks spray. 🐸
Last but not least…
Can you eat these super delicious foods, even though they are SO smelly?!
Of course, what smells the worst can depend on where you're from, but 2 super stinky foods often top the list: Sweden's surströmming and Taiwan's stinky tofu.
Surströmming is fermented fish with a slimy texture and it smells like rotten eggs, while stinky tofu smells like smelly feet or rotting garbage. 👣
Some people love these funky foods, and there are even eating contests for the brave.
Do you think you could win a contest like that?