People In Mexico City Losing Their Sense of Smell. Produced by theEMBARQ Network on Vimeo.

Rhys Thom and I recently visited Mexico City where we met with two researchers at UNAM – Mexico’s National University – who are doing some fascinating research. Robyn Hudson, a charismatic professor, originally from Australia who has been living in Mexico City for quite some time, and her colleague Marco Guarneros, a fellow biomedical researcher, conducted a study comparing the ability of Mexico City’s residents to detect certain smells, with the ability of people living in a Tlaxcala, a neighboring town. Mexico City and Tlaxcala are similar in many respects – they share a similar culture and climate, situated high in the mountains of Mexico. But there is one crucial difference: Mexico City has much higher levels of air pollution. When compared to their neighbors, people living in Mexico City need higher concentrations of a smell in order to identify it, a clear indication that their sense of smell is deteriorating.

Watch the movie to learn more.

Below are a few pictures we took while making the movie.