Scent of Space Being Recreated by Chemist

The scoop: NASA recently asked Steve Pearce, a chemist at Omega Ingredients and Maverick Innovations, to reproduce and bottle the smell of outer space. Why?

Smell of Space (12:38 PM): Hi Dave.

Dave on Earth (12:39 PM): Hi Steve!
Thanks for signing on -- looks like you jumped through all of the right hoops.

Smell of Space (12:40 PM): Yes, took me a moment to guess the correct configuration.
The end of another busy day!

Dave on Earth (12:41 PM): I'll try and keep this short, then.
Can you briefly describe where you work, what you do?

Smell of Space (12:43 PM): I have several companies -- so an owner-manager, if you like:
Maverick Innovations does the development, and Omega Ingredients does the manufacturing and selling.
We're situated about 60 miles outside London near Ipswich.

Dave on Earth (12:44 PM): You said development, manufacturing, and selling -- I assume you mean scents and flavors?

Smell of Space (12:45 PM): My day-to-day job consists of developing and making odorous materials, extracts, mixtures and so on to help customers produce winning products.
Things like beverages, dairy products, flavors, fragrances, cosmetics and toiletries, mostly.

Dave on Earth (12:45 PM): I see, so you're one of the guys behind smelly things in the world.
I'd be willing to bet $5 that your office has some seriously interesting smells hanging around.

Smell of Space (12:46 PM): You would win the $5 for sure... How about some devil's dung?

Dave on Earth (12:46 PM): Devil's dung? Sounds pretty unpleasant, to say the least.

Smell of Space (12:47 PM): It's a very smelly and unpleasant plant, but used in Asian cooking (in curries etc.)
Also known as Asafoetida, an herb, and it does have a fetid smell!

Dave on Earth (12:48 PM): I could imagine :)
Now, speaking of odors -- I heard you have been working on cooking up something special for NASA. What gives?

Smell of Space (12:49 PM): Yes, something very unusual...
We have been approached about helping with a project to re-create the smell of space.

Dave on Earth (12:49 PM): Before I ask "how," why the heck did NASA approach you?
And what's so important about it to them?

Smell of Space (12:51 PM): This all started about a year ago when I was approached by Rob Blackson -- an American working over here as a curator of the Reg Vardy Gallery at the University of Sunderland in northern England.

Dave on Earth (12:52 PM): Why would a scent chemist like yourself help with an art gallery?

Smell of Space (12:54 PM): Great question. Rob wanted to put on an unusual art exhibition... one with smells.
I worked with Rob on this and the exhibit went live earlier this year for six weeks, and it was called "If There Ever Was" -- a showcase of extinct and impossible smells.
I ended up doing Cleopatra's hair, the last meal of a Jesse Tefaro -- a murderer condemned to death -- and the inside of the Mir Space Station.

Dave on Earth (12:54 PM): Well, that would certainly attract NASA's attention (no pun intended).

Smell of Space (12:55 PM): Yes -- it came to the attention of someone working for NASA and they got a hold of me.

Dave on Earth (12:56 PM): Now the "how" question:
How did you recreate the scent of the MIR space station, let alone that of a dead Egyptian queen?

Smell of Space signed off at 12:57 PM.

Smell of Space signed on at 12:59 PM.

Dave on Earth (12:59 PM): Looks like you had some technical difficulties?

Smell of Space (1:02 PM): Yes... everything locked up there for a few moments.
Anyway, the problem on Mir -- a great concept with a wonderfully complex system for allowing the recycling of air and water.
But the designers forgot that the cosmonauts would almost certainly take vodka on board...
The metabolites cosmonauts breathed out from drinking it plus perspiration affected the filters -- and it lead to the formation of some pretty unpleasant-smelling materials such as acetone, acetaldehyde etc.
So I mimicked that chemistry and produced something unpleasant without making it dangerous.

Dave on Earth (1:02 PM): ...and what did it smell like?

Smell of Space (1:07 PM): Well, unpleasant is certainly a good word.
Just imagine sweaty feet and stale body odor, mix that odor with nail polish remover and gasoline... then you get close!

Dave on Earth (1:08 PM): Yummy. And did you get a Mir space station cosmonaut to say "yep, that's it!"

Smell of Space (1:09 PM): Unfortunately, we haven't had an opportunity to show it to any cosmonauts... but they might all agree on one thing: it was horrible.

Dave on Earth (1:11 PM): So it was a bit of guesswork on your part?

Smell of Space (1:12 PM): Well, we tried to map out the likely chemistry and what you'd expect.
We also used natural materials to mimic the odor, so we feel it was pretty accurate in the end -- and it certainly conveyed the sense that it wouldn't have been nice to be trapped in Mir for too long.

Dave on Earth (1:14 PM): I would guess not.
Now the NASA project: does it have a name, and why do they want the scent?