About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the benefit of humanity.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/feature-stories/a-sniff-test-for-coronavirus/
May 04, 2020... Prof. Noam Sobel, of the Department of Neurobiology, is a leading authority on how olfaction affects human behavior and health. Data emerging from the coronavirus pandemic show that many patients experience a temporary loss of their sense of smell. So dramatic is this loss that, in some countries, patients who report a sudden loss of olfactory acuity are declared to be coronavirus patients, even without further testing. The CDC recently added olfactory loss as a formal symptom of COVID-19.
Apr 02, 2020... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—April 2, 2020—Along with fever, cough, and shortness of breath, many COVID-19 patients report a temporary loss of sense of smell. It appears that olfactory loss is significantly greater in coronavirus patients compared to the loss often experienced during a cold and, less commonly, in influenza (non-COVID-19) patients. In some countries, such as France, a patient who claims to have sudden onset of olfactory loss will be diagnosed as a coronavirus patient – without even being tested. A similar approach is being considered in the U.K. Based on this data, Weizmann Institute of Science investigators, in collaboration with Israel’s Edith Wolfson Medical Center, developed SmellTracker – an online platform that enables self-monitoring of one’s sense of smell – in order to detect early signs of COVID-19, or in the absence of other symptoms.
Apr 05, 2020...
Is your sense of smell suddenly not working very well? Not to panic you, but sudden olfactory loss has emerged as a significant symptom in about 60 percent of COVID-19 patients.
In fact, in France, people reporting a dramatic drop-off in their ability to smell are automatically assumed coronavirus-positive.
Based on this data, Weizmann Institute scientists, in collaboration with Wolfson Medical Center in Holon, developed SmellTracker – an online platform that enables self-monitoring of smell in order to detect early signs of COVID-19.
Apr 20, 2020...
Humans touch their own faces often because they are subconsciously smelling themselves for a variety of reasons, scientists believe. The team also conducted a survey to see whether people subconsciously smell themselves and others, and found more than half of the participants had smelled a stranger.
The authors of the article titled Are humans constantly but subconsciously smelling themselves? published in the journal Royal Society journal Philosophical Transactions B reviewed existing studies to understand if and why humans smell themselves.
May 11, 2020...
If you’re getting bored in quarantine, here’s a fun new hobby to try: sniffing stuff in your kitchen. Two international projects are asking ordinary people to rate the scents of household items in order to gather data on one of COVID-19’s more mysterious symptoms: anosmia, the loss of the ability to smell.
It’s still unclear to scientists how widespread anosmia is among COVID-19 patients, which typically causes a fever, dry cough and difficulty breathing. And whether it can be a useful way to track the spread of the disease is still to be determined — leaving researchers eager to gather as much data on the symptom as possible.
Apr 27, 2020...
COVID-19 has separated us from the world in surprising ways. Yes, we all miss our friends and loved ones, and we miss going to restaurants and stores and movies and concerts. But there’s another pastime that COVID-19 has deprived us of, even if we don’t realize it: the simple pleasure of subconsciously touching our own faces and sniffing our hands.
As COVID-19 spread, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned people against touching their faces — and for good reason: A 2006 study suggested that nearly 25 percent of respiratory disease transfer could be attributed to people touching their faces.
Apr 29, 2020...
An unconscious person’s response to odors after a serious brain injury may be a simple yet powerful signal of how aware they are and how likely they are to survive and recover, a new study suggests, relying on responses to the scent of shampoo and the stench of rotting fish.
Patients who survive brain damage from trauma, stroke, or heart attack are plunged into forms of unconsciousness that vary from minimal consciousness to unresponsive wakefulness, sometimes called a vegetative state. Specialists trying to tell who is in which state have fared only a little better than a coin flip: About 4 in 10 people thought to be unconscious are actually aware.
Apr 30, 2020... REHOVOT, ISRAEL—April 30, 2020—If an unconscious person responds to smell through a slight change in their nasal airflow pattern, they are likely to regain consciousness. This is the conclusion from a new study conducted by Weizmann Institute scientists and colleagues at Israel’s Loewenstein Rehabilitation Hospital. According to the findings, published in the journal Nature, 100% of the unconscious brain-injured patients who responded to a “sniff test” developed by the researchers regained consciousness during the four-year study period.
May 12, 2020...
For a single ant, the world can be an overwhelmingly big place. To safely navigate their environs, ants rely on collective cognition.
According to a new study, published Tuesday in the journal eLife, collective brainpower makes seemingly chaotic environs navigable.
“Cooperation is a common means by which animals can increase their cognitive capacity, and we were intrigued as to whether this cooperation allows ants to extend the range of environments in which they can efficiently collect food,” first study author Aviram Gelblum, a postdoctoral fellow at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, said in a news release.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/feature-stories/using-our-senses-to-fight-coronavirus/
Jun 10, 2020...
Just as COVID-19 is still advancing, so is the research of Weizmann Institute scientists as they develop ways to identify, predict, treat, and prevent the illness. One particularly innovative researcher is Prof. Noam Sobel.
A neurobiologist who is a world leader in olfaction research, Prof. Sobel works in the Weizmann tradition of following his curiosity as he harnesses the sense of smell to fight COVID. His previous studies have shown that our olfactory system has powers that many of us would never have imagined; he has used the sense of smell – our most ancient sense – to quantify the smell of fear; shed light on social miscues in autism and diagnose the condition; help locked-in, vegetative patients communicate; reveal subconscious reactions to the opposite sex; and much more.
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