Maryland Science Center
601 Light Street
Baltimore, MD 21230-3812
www.mdsci.org

A veteran Sense of Smell Day participant, the Maryland Science Center participated for the fifth time this past April by adding even more exciting activities and utilizing a newly built wing of the Center. With over 1600 guests their celebration was a huge success.

Canine Guests
Baltimore City Police Sergeant Sue Dilmann came with her four year old black lab, Sampson. Sampson, an Explosives Ordnance K-9 Unit Dog, performed a gunpowder search for the rapt audience. Visitors got to pet Sampson as well as pose for pictures with him.

The Match-the-Smell Game
This game challenged visitors to quickly waft scented tubes then line the tubes up with the appropriate photographed image. Rose and Baby Powder were the two scents that continually stumped the guests.
 

 
The Jellybean Taste Test: While eating three different flavored red jellybeans (Red Apple, Cinnamon and Cherry) guests were asked to sniff coffee grounds…they quickly realized they could not taste the jelly beans. The lesson mimicked the effects of a cold or nasal congestion and demonstrated how important smell is to our sense of taste.

Other activities included:

Candle Scent Test: Visitors sniffed eight different unlabeled and uniformly colored candles and had to correctly identify the scents. Most people found this was a bit of a challenge without the color cues to guide them.

Smelling Bee: Guests were asked to identify 11 different scents correctly for a chance to win a t-shirt and IMAX tickets. The winner identified all 11 correctly -- a first in this event's history!

National Odor Contest: Visitors were asked to vote for either Apple Pie or Popcorn to be the “national odor.”