Human Smell-Technology Initiatives: Can Smell Improve Road Safety?

Online communication until now has involved only two of our senses: sight and hearing. However, research is emerging to communicate smell in numerous human-based applications. This paper reviews several general applications of smell, discusses the status of implementing smell to improve road safety, and presents other vital considerations. The general applications include smelling screens, mobile notifications, virtual reality, highway landscaping, outdoor environments, video games, and presentation technology. The road safety implementation addresses driver performance, smell effects on driver performance (cognitive and psychological), and two emerging in-vehicle smell systems (empathetic-car system and CO2 filtration system). Based on this review, can smell be used to improve road safety? The answer is Yes and No since some smell scents positively affect drivers, while others adversely affect them. Other considerations include digital smell technology (DST), driving simulator studies, and online resources. In particular, with the DST, it is possible to sense, transmit, and receive smell through the internet.