Inspired by Dougal Stermer's book 'Vanishing Flora', Roman Kaiser worked for more than ten years on collecting the scent of 267 endangered plant species worldwide. In the present volume, he invites us to a journey along the hotspots of biodiversity, all of them bearing endangered species, and discusses their scents. This compilation renders the book an important contribution to the UN International Year of Biodiversity.

It happened in Manchester, May 12-14, 2004. - For the fifth time since the early 1990's the Royal Society of Chemistry and the Society of the Chemical Industry jointly held their 'flavours & fragrances' conference, this time in the Manchester Conference Centre of the UMIST Manchester. The meeting saw over one hundred participants from one dozen countries, and was the largest of the series so far. In two and a half days divided into five sessions, twenty-five speakers from academia and industry alike presented their recent research results related to this exciting field, including Natural Products, Foods and Flavors, Perfumery and Olfaction, and last but not least Fragrance Chemistry. Research is more than ever central to the F&F industry with its constant demand for innovation and its frequently changing trends. Especially, in the classic and well-explored domains of musks and amber odorants fascinating new discoveries were made only very recently, which proves the endless possibilities in the search for new aroma chemicals. This was also reflected in the logo of the conference, which featured Ambrocenide? as a new powerful ambery odorant that emerged from classical cedrene chemistry - and it is as well reflected in four of the sixteen conference papers that are collected in this special issue of Chemistry & Biodiversity. With its focus on biorelevant chemicals, Chemistry & Biodiversity was predestined to publish the diverse highlight papers of the 'flavours & fragrances' conference. Fragrance and fragrance materials by definition elicit a biological response, serve as versatile signals, trigger the sense of smell and taste in various ways - and every odorant design is nothing more than 'chemistry probing nature'. But Fragrance Chemistry can also document and even preserve the biodiversity of scents, as was the topic of the lecture of Roman Kaiser, which had been published in advance as the first full paper of Chemistry & Biodiversity.

In recent years, our knowledge of the anatomy and physiology of olfaction has grown enormously, accompanied by a growing appreciation of scent. This is reflected in the fact that the 2004 Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded for discoveries of 'Odorant Receptors and the Organization of the Olfactory System'. This book naturally supports such developments, and takes the reader on a fascinating fragrant journey around the world to some of the exciting places the author has visited during his 30 years of olfactory research. Following an introductory section to the world of natural scents, including their biological meaning and history, the fragrance and flavor chemist, Roman Kaiser, who is renowned for his 'headspace' analytical technique, revisits some memorable scents. In doing so, he leads us to such exotic places as Lower Amazonia, Papua New Guinea, India, and many rain-forest biotopes in his quest for new molecules and new scent concepts, showing us along the way how a scent like tatami can be linked to culture. The third and final section describes the analysis of the compositions of the presented scents.

This book is the long awaited completely revised and extended edition of Gunther Ohloff's standard work "Scent and Fragrances: The Fascination of Odors and Their Chemical Perspectives". The prominent chemists Gunther Ohloff, Wilhelm Pickenhagen, and Philip Kraft convey the scientist, the perfumer, as well as the interested layman with a vivid and up-to-date picture of the state of the art of the chemistry of odorants and the research in odor perception. The book details on the molecular basis of olfaction, olfactory characterization of perfumery materials, structure-odor relationships, the chemical synthesis of odorants, and the chemistry of essential oils and odorants from the animal kingdom, backed up by ca. 400 perfumery examples and historical aspects. It will serve as a thorough introductory text for all those interested in the molecular world of odors. This book is written for everyone who wants to know more about the molecular basis of odor, and the relationships between chemical structures and olfactory properties. The great structural diversity of odorants, their synthesis, natural occurrence and their structure?odor correlation demonstrate what a fascinating science Fragrance Chemistry indeed is.

Flora Dempsey is the headstrong only child of Lewis Dempsey, a college professor and world famous critic. When Lewis passes away, Flora returns to her New England hometown to act as his literary executor. There, she finds herself responsible for a manuscript that he was secretly writing at the end of his life—love poems to a girlfriend Flora didn't know he had. As Flora is besieged by well-wishers and literary vultures alike, she tries to figure out how to navigate it all: the fate of the poems, the girlfriend who wants a place in her life, the wounds left by her parents’ divorce, and her uncertain future. Brimming with energy, humor, and the elbow-patchy wisdom of Flora’s still-vivid father, this enchanting debut is the uplifting story of a young woman striving to become the “perfect reader” of her father’s life, as well as her own.

After solving the environmental problems of the United States, dictator Chairman Rahma must fight off new weapons being deployed by the corporations and deal with unsettling reports of mutants.

For centuries orchids have been among the most popular of plant families, with thousands of species and hybrids cultivated worldwide for the diversity, beauty, and intricacy of their flowers. The Genera Orchidacearum series represents a robust and natural classification of the orchids, something that has eluded plant scientists and orchid enthusiasts for years. The editors, who are all distinguished orchid specialists, incorporate a wealth of new DNA data into a truly phylogenetic classification, identifying the areas and taxa that merit additional work. To this end, they have invited several international specialists to contribute in their particular areas of expertise. Each volume provides comprehensive coverage of one or two orchid subfamilies, and the series as a whole will be an indispensable reference tool for scientists, orchid breeders, and growers. Orchidaceae is the largest monocotyledon family and perhaps the largest plant family in terms of number of species, approximately 25,000. Although the fossil record is limited, active molecular research in recent years has unravelled many of the complexities and phylogenetics of this cosmopolitan plant family. This sixth and final volume treats 140 genera in tribes Dendrobieae and Vandeae of the largest subfamily, Epidendroideae, including some of the showiest orchids often used in hybridizing. Comprehensive treatments are provided for each genus, which include complete nomenclature, description, distribution (with map), anatomy, palynology, cytogenetics, phytochemistry, phylogenetics, pollination, ecology, and economic uses. Cultivation notes are included for those genera known to be in hobbyist collections. Genera are beautifully illustrated with line drawings and colour photographs. An Addendum updates a few generic accounts published in past volumes. A cumulative glossary, list of generic synonyms with their equivalents, and list of all series contributors round out this final volume in the series.

2012 Florida Book Awards, Silver Medal for Florida Non-Fiction "FANTASTIC. If I did not know most of the main players I would have thought the author had a vivid and twisted imagination."--Paul Martin Brown, author of Wild Orchids of Florida "A fascinating true story of obsession, greed, and lust for the unobtainable. Reminds me a great deal of The Maltese Falcon. This rare flower is definitely the stuff that dreams are made of."--Ace Atkins, author of Devil's Garden and Infamous "Pittman has captured the extreme competition, unique characters, and general insanity that often typify the orchid world. The Scent of Scandal exemplifies how passion and profit can overrule common sense and the law."--Scott Steward, former associate editor, North American Native Orchid Journal After its Peruvian discovery in 2002, Phragmipedium kovachii became the rarest and most sought-after orchid in the world. Prices soared to $10,000 on the black market. Then one showed up at Marie Selby Botanical Gardens, where every year more than 100,000 people visit. They come for the lush landscape on Sarasota Bay and for Selby's vast orchid collection, one of the most magnificent in the world. The collision between Selby's scientists and the smugglers of Phrag. Kovachii, a rare ladyslipper orchid hailed as the most significant and beautiful new species discovered in a century, led to search warrants, a grand jury investigation, and criminal charges. It made headlines around the country, cost the gardens hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, and led to tremendous internal turmoil. Investigative journalist Craig Pittman unravels this tangled web to shine a spotlight on flaws in the international treaties governing trade in endangered wildlife--which may protect individual plants and animals in shipping but do little to halt the destruction of whole colonies in the wild. The Scent of Scandal unspools like a riveting mystery novel, stranger than anything in Susan Orlean's The Orchid Thief or the film Adaptation. Pittman shows how some people can become so obsessed--with beauty, with profit, with fame--that they will ignore everything, even the law.

From the #1 bestselling author of Inside of a Dog and The Year of the Puppy—“an incredible journey into the olfactory world of man’s best friend” (O, The Oprah Magazine), Alexandra Horowitz’s follow-up to her New York Times bestseller explains how dogs experience the world through their most spectacular organ—the nose. In her “fascinating book…Horowitz combines the expertise of a scientist with an easy, lively writing style” (The New York Times Book Review) as she imagines what it is like to be a dog. Guided by her own dogs, Finnegan and Upton, Horowitz sets off on a quest through the cutting-edge science behind the olfactory abilities of the dog. In addition to speaking to cognitive researchers and smell experts, Horowitz visits detection-dog trainers and training centers; she meets researchers working with dogs to detect cancerous cells and anticipate epileptic seizure or diabetic shock; and she even attempts to smell-train her own nose. As we come to understand how rich, complex, and exciting the world around us is to the canine nose, Horowitz changes our perspective on dogs forever. Readers will finish this book feeling that they have broken free of their human constraints and understanding smell as never before; that they have, for however fleetingly, been a dog. And, as The Boston Globe says about Being a Dog, “becoming more doglike, not surprisingly, can make anyone’s life a little more vivid.”