Just because you can, it doesn't mean you should. Wise words and, dare I say, highly relevant in the context of the pursuit of ever more realistic VR experiences. To wit, would you really want to include accurate odours?
Hold that thought, because we haven't addressed the "can you" bit. It turns out a group of researchers think they can, courtesy of a new approach that involves using ultrasound to stimulate the scent-processing part of the brain. Indeed, they claim the technology can be used not just for smell but also as a highly efficient method for inputting data into the brain. Yes, really.
"We pointed an ultrasound probe at the scent-processing region of the brain to obtain different sensations. Different focal spots corresponded to different smells, which we’ve replicated first-try on two people and validated with a blind trial," the researchers say via this blogpost.
The mere suggestion of such a technology has been enough, inevitably, to have some observers recoil....
English (US)