Smelling this particular scent could protect you against dementia, claim scientists
A team from Kyoto University and the University of Tsukuba asked 28 women to wear one scent, while another 22 women wore plain water instead.
Scientists in Japan may have found an unexpected way to protect brain health — and it comes in the form of a fragrance. A team from Kyoto University and the University of Tsukuba conducted a study where they asked 28 women to wear a rose-scented essential oil on their clothing every day for a month, while another 22 women, acting as controls, wore plain water instead, and when both groups were scanned with MRI at the end of the experiment, the results revealed something remarkable: the women exposed to the rose scent showed measurable increases in their brain’s gray matter. "This study is the first to show that continuous scent inhalation changes brain structure," the researchers wrote.
The growth was not spread evenly across the brain, and while regions like the amygdala, which helps manage emotions, and the orbitofrontal cortex, which processes smells, showed little change, one region stood out: the posterior cingulate cortex, or PCC, a part of the brain tied to memory and associations, which grew significantly during the study. As the researchers explained, "The PCC is involved in memory-odor associations, odor memory retrieval, and semantic memory processes. The PCC, which processes odor memories, was more activated than the amygdala, which is responsible for sensing odors."
One theory is that because the amygdala didn’t have to remain alert once the brain recognized the constant presence of the rose scent, the PCC took over and kept processing and storing the information, while another possibility raised by the researchers is that the rose scent may have been unconsciously labeled as unpleasant by the brain, which forced the PCC to regulate the resulting emotions and in turn strengthened its activity and structure. Whatever the reason, the findings point to new possibilities for aromatherapy. Wearing a fragrance every day may be as simple as spritzing perfume, but the long-term impact could go far beyond affecting mood.
"The result of the current study suggests that continuous inhalation of rose essential oil may prevent brain atrophy and prevent dementia," the authors concluded. And this isn’t the only research pointing to the power of scent. A team at the University of California, Irvine in their 2023 study tested whether nightly exposure to fragrance could improve memory in older adults, asking participants between the ages of 60 and 85 to inhale one of seven different scents — ranging from rose to lavender — for two hours each night over a period of six months, while another group received almost no scent at all. The results were hard to ignore: the group exposed to scent showed a 226% improvement in memory performance compared to the control group.
Brain scans in the study revealed structural changes in the white matter of the uncinate fasciculus. This neural pathway connects regions such as the amygdala and entorhinal cortex to the prefrontal cortex, suggesting that scent not only sharpens memory but also strengthens the brain’s physical wiring. These changes suggested stronger neural connectivity, showing just how powerful regular olfactory stimulation can be. Because the PCC is known to shrink in people with Alzheimer’s disease, the results are especially significant. Keeping it active and stimulated through scent might one day offer a simple, low-cost way to protect memory and cognitive health.
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