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AI Fragrance Technology Could Ease Pressure on Endangered Plants
Some popular perfumes use ingredients from plants that are becoming threatened.
One example is oudh, which comes from certain Aquilaria trees.
Scientists and companies are testing ways to make similar scents without gathering as much material from wild plants.
One company says AI helped it recreate a rare tree’s smell from a small piece of bark.
Another says it can grow fragrance compounds using plant cells.
Some experts worry that these alternatives will not stop people from wanting the original ingredients.
They also say plants can face other dangers besides harvesting.
AI can help predict how chemicals smell, but a living plant’s scent depends on many things, including where and how it grows.
High demand for plant-derived perfume ingredients, including oudh, has contributed to illegal felling of wild Aquilaria trees.
AI company Osmo says it used a small bark sample to reconstruct the scent of a rare tree.
BioHarvest Sciences says it can produce fragrance compounds from a cell culture of an unnamed endangered plant.
Conservationists and perfumers caution that substitutes may not stop demand for wild ingredients or address other threats to species.
Researchers say AI can predict how molecules may smell, but a scent formula cannot capture all the complexity of a living plant.
- Who
- Researchers, biotechnology companies, perfumers, and conservationists, including Osmo, BioHarvest Sciences, and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
- What
- They are exploring AI and biotechnology to recreate or produce fragrance ingredients associated with endangered plants.
- Where
- The work includes research on an unnamed endangered south-east Asian fragrance plant and collection of microbes from clouds during two flights.
- When
- The article describes current research and a BioHarvest agreement that anticipates production, with limited production potentially beginning in 2027; Cloud Reverie launched in 2026.
- Why
- To explore ways of producing valuable scents without repeatedly harvesting pressured wild plants, though experts dispute whether these methods will meaningfully aid conservation.
Potential benefits
Conservation concerns
Can substitutes reduce harvesting pressure?
Potential benefits
Osmo and BioHarvest say AI or cell culture can help produce plant-associated scents and compounds without repeatedly sourcing them from wild plants.
Conservation concerns
Mandy Aftel and Rhian Smith warn that alternatives do not necessarily stop consumers buying wild-sourced ingredients or address other causes of species decline.
Can technology recreate a plant’s scent?
Potential benefits
Osmo says AI can use chemical data to predict how combinations of molecules will be perceived and help recreate scents.
Conservation concerns
Christina Agapakis says a recreated scent is only a fragment and cannot reproduce the living organism or the soil, climate, season, and ecology behind its scent.
Key facts
- Oudh source
- Oudh comes from fragrant resin produced when some Aquilaria trees are damaged.
- Osmo training data
- Alex Wiltschko said Osmo trained its AI on more than five million human responses to smells.
- Osmo sample
- Wiltschko said the company recreated a rare tree’s scent using a piece of bark about the size of a finger.
- BioHarvest plan
- The company announced an agreement anticipating production of 20 tonnes of a fragrance composition.
- Potential production date
- BioHarvest said limited production could potentially begin in 2027.
- Cloud microbes
- Thirteen microbes collected from clouds were found to produce 57 scent molecules.
- Cloud Reverie
- The perfume made using those microbes as a starting point launched in 2026.
Quotes
Alex Wiltschko
Founder of Osmo, a company developing AI for predicting and recreating smells
“The challenge is that human demand can be effectively unlimited while biological supply is not. We believe biotechnology can help close that gap, not by replacing nature but by allowing us to use what nature has given us without continually putting the source under pressure.”
freepressjournal.in
“Being able to recreate the scent of an endangered plant would be a huge win for both the environment but also the brands.”
freepressjournal.in
Mandy Aftel
Natural perfumer, author, and founder of the Aftel Archive of Curious Scents
“Calling this conservation is greenwashing.”
freepressjournal.in
Sources
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