When someone is happy, can you smell it?

    You can usually tell when someone is happy based on seeing them smile, hearing them laugh or perhaps from receiving a big hug. But can you also smell their happiness? Surprising new research suggests that happiness does indeed have a scent, and that the experience of happiness can be transmitted through smell, reports Phys.org.

    For the study, 12 young men were shown videos meant to bring about a variety of emotions while researchers gathered sweat samples from them. All of the men were healthy and none of them were drug users or smokers, and all were asked to abstain from drinking or eating smelly foods during the study period. 

    Those sweat samples were then given to 36 equally healthy young women to smell, while researchers monitored their reactions. Only women were selected to smell the samples, apparently because previous research has shown that women have a better sense of smell than men and are also more sensitive to emotional signaling—though it's unclear why only men were chosen to produce the scents.

    Researchers found that the behavior of the women after smelling the scents—particularly their facial expressions—indicated a relationship between the emotional states of the men who produced the sweat and the women who sniffed them. 

    “Human sweat produced when a person is happy brings about a state similar to happiness in somebody who breathes this smell,” said study co-author Gun Semin, a professor at Koc University in Turkey.

    This is a fascinating finding because it not only means that happiness does have a scent, but that the scent is capable of transmitting the emotion to others. The study also found that other emotions, such as fear, seem to carry a scent too. This ensures previous research suggesting that some negative emotions have a smell, but it is the first time this has proved to be true of positive feelings.

    Researchers have yet to isolate(分离) exactly what the chemical compound for the happiness smell is, but you might imagine what the potential applications for such a finding could be. Happiness perfumes, for instance, could be invented. Scent therapies（香味疗法）could also be developed to help people through depression or anxiety.

    Perhaps the most surprising result of the study, however, is our broadened understanding of how emotions get communicated, and also how our own emotions are potentially managed through our social context and the emotional states of those around us. 

    As a young boy, I sometimes traveled the country roads with my dad. He was a rural mill carrier, and on Saturdays he would ask me to go with him. Driving through the countryside was always an adventure: There were animals to see, people to visit, and chocolate cookies if you knew where to stop, and Dad did.

    In the spring, Dad delivered boxes full of baby chickens, and when 1 was a boy it was such a fun to stick your finger 'through one of the holes of the boxes and let the baby birds peck on your fingers.

    On Dad' s final day of work, it took him well into the evening to complete his rounds because at least one member from each family was waiting at their mailbox to thank him for his friendship and his years of service. "Two hundred and nineteen mailboxes on my route." he used to say, "and a story at every one. " One lady had no mailbox, so Dad took the mail in to her every day because she was nearly blind. Once inside, he read her mail and helped her pay her bills.

Mailboxes were sometimes used for things other than mail. One note left in a mailbox read. "Nat, take these eggs to Marian; she's baking a cake and doesn't have any eggs. " Mailboxes might be buried in the snow, or broken, or lying on the groom:. bat the mail was always delivered On cold days Dad might find one of his customers waiting for him with a cup of hot chocolate. A young wrote letters but had no stamps, so she left a few button on the envelope in the mailbox; Dad paid for the stamps. One businessman used to leave large amounts of cash in his mailbox for Dad to take to the bank. Once, the amount came to 8 32,000.

    A dozen years ago, when I traveled back to my hometown on the sad occasion of Dad's death,  the mailboxes along the way reminded me of some of his stories. I thought I knew them all, but that wasn't the case.

    As I drove home, I noticed two lamp poles, one on each side of the street. When my dad was around, those poles supported wooden boxes about four feet off the ground. One box was painted green and the other was red, and each had a long narrow hole at the top with white lettering: SANTA CLAUS, NORTH POLE. For years children had dropped letters to Santa through those holes.

    I made a turn at the comer and drove past the post office and across the railroad tracks to our house. Mom and I were sitting at the kitchen table when I heard footsteps. There, at the door, stood Frank Townsend, Dad's postmaster and great friend for many years. So we all sat down at the table and began to tell stories.

    At one point Frank looked at me with tears in his eyes. " What are we going to do about the letters this Christmas?" he asked.

    "The letters?"

    'I guess you never knew. "

    "Knew what?"

    " Remember, when you were a kid and you used to put your letters to Santa in those green and red boxes on Main Street? It was your dad who answered all those letters every year. "

    I just sat there with tears in my eyes. It wasn't hard for me to imagine Dad sitting at the old table in our basement reading those letters and answering each one. I have since spoken with several of the people who received Christmas letters during their childhood, and they told me how amazed they were that Santa had known so much about their homes and families.

For me, just knowing that story about my father was the gift of a lifetime.

    In a class this past December,after I wrote some directions on the board for students about their final examination,one young woman quickly took a picture of the board using her smart phone.When I looked in her direction,she apologized:"Sorry.Was it wrong to take a picture?"

    “I can't read my own handwriting,”the young woman explained."It's best if I take a picture of your writing so I can understand the notes."

    That remark started a class-wide conversation about taking a picture instead of taking notes.For those in the photo-taking camp,motivations extended beyond their inability to comprehend their own handwriting.Some took pictures of notes because they knew their phone was a safe place to store material.They might lose paper,but they wouldn't lose their phones.Some took photos because they wanted to record exactly the manner in which I had noted information on the board.Others told me that during class they liked to listen to the discussion attentively.

    Yet the use of cameras as note takers,though it may be convenient,does raise significant questions for the classroom.Is a picture an effective replacement for the process of note-taking?

    Instructors encourage students to take notes because the act of doing so is more than merely recording necessary information—it helps prepare the way for understanding.Encouraging students to take notes may be an old-fashioned instructional method,but that a method has a long history doesn't mean it's out of date.Writing things down engages a student's brain in listening,visual,and kinesthetic learning—a view supported by a longstanding research.The act of writing down information enables a person to begin committing it to memory,and to process and combine it,establishing the building blocks of learning new concepts.

    Taking a picture does indeed record the information,but it deletes some of the necessary mental engagement that taking notes employs.So can the two be equally effective?

    I'm not sure how to measure the effectiveness of either method.For now,I allow students to take notes however they see fit—handwritten or photographed—because I figure that some notes,no matter the method of note-taking, are better than none.

    For Kim Duffy, sending away her teenage daughter was the best hope for saving the girl's life.

    Corinne, then 17, had been struggling with bulimia (贪食症) and anorexia (厌食症) for more than five years. Duffy and her husband, Terry, found a residential facility in Virginia, and Corinne signed on for a two-month stay in the summer of 2009.

    Today, Corinne's healthy and pursuing a master's degree in Colorado. She and her parents believe the holistic (整体) approach and individualized focus were key to her recovery. And they know they had access to unique resources. "We were fortunate," says Duffy. "We could pay for everything."

    But many can't. According to a report released in November 2014 by the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, between 600, 000 and one million Canadians suffer from an eating disorder. Public in patient programs often won't admit patients until they're in life-threatening condition. Private clinics often have a long waitlists and high costs-at Homewood, in Guelph, Ont., a room is $ 305 to $360 per day.

    The Duffs' struggle led then to connect other families with the quality of care they received in the United Sates. In late 2013, hey founded the WaterStone Clinic, a private eating disorder center in Toronto.

    Since the facility opened, 170 clients have received treatment. They take yoga, do art therapy and participate in meal preparation, building real-life skills with a support team. Programs run weekdays from 8 a. m. to 2 p. m., and notably, so far WaterStone has no waiting list.

    But this approach is costly: approximately $650 per day. Realizing that the price tag puts WaterStone out of reach for many, the Duffys created the WaterStone Foundation-a charity that provides aid to patients who can't afford treatment the following year. Candidates are assessed by two committees that make a decision based on clinical and financial need. Since 2014, the foundation has helped 100 people.

    Duffy also wants to change the public system. In June of this year, the foundation awarded ＄170, 000 to four Ontario hopitals offering creative treatment to eating disorder patients. "Yes, people need private treatment," she says, "but it's important to help out on a broader scale, too."

Of the tens of thousands of ships on the ocean bottom, only a handful, less than I percent, contain negotiable treasure, such as gold and jewels. Most give us a different priceless treasure — history. A sunken ship lies in trust, preserved in the airless environment of the sea and those in deep water are especially well protected. A sunken ship, therefore, can be a rare window through which a moment in time is glimpsed.

The wreck of HMS Endurance, which has finally been located deep beneath the icy seas of Antarctica after being lost 110 years ago, was arguably the most valuable shipwreck ever sought. That's because its discovery adds another thrilling new chapter to an already fascinating tale of perseverance and survival that has echoed down the decades and still inspires today.

Incredibly well preserved at a depth of almost two miles, the ship is little changed from the day in November 1914 when it finally sank beneath the ice. Endurance became embedded in ice while crossing Antarctica's Weddell Sea. The video shot by underwater search vehicles shows painted timbers, an undamaged guardrail (护栏), with the name "Endurance" written above the five-pointed symbol of a polar star.

"I tell you, you would have to be made of stone not to feel a bit soft at the sight of that star and the name above," Mensun Bound, the mission's marine archaeologist, told the: BBC. "You can see a porthole (舷窗) that is in Shackleton's cabin. At that moment, you really do feel the breath of the great man upon the back of your neck." Shackleton's leadership was crucial to getting his men out alive. The reason why Shackleton is still applauded as a great man becomes obvious when you consider what he achieved in the face of disasters and hardships during his 1914-16 expedition. The practicality and humanity he showed in the face of severe situations was arguably praised.