DefinePK

Abstract

Nowadays, the most challenging task is achieving relaxation. Indeed it is important for our physical and mental health to get rid of all day stress. One of the utmost ubiquitous of all senses is the sense of smell but it is also the one which has hardly been explored in the field of Human and Computer Interaction. Human emotions and memories are closely associated with the sense of smell as it gives information about different events that are part of one’s personal life, for example, the smell of fire, and pollution, it also helps us when we are looking for food or even sometimes it works as an alarm for reminding us to do something important. This paper presents two different categories of olfactory devices that can be controlled from a remote location via a smartphone. We categorized these devices by means of the level of concentration and the intensity of smell they are producing. We also talk about the basic structure and system design of olfactory devices. Furthermore, this paper presents a set of applications where the olfactory devices are used and the associated software framework. We also discuss different tests that were conducted in order to show the usability of olfactory devices and their results.