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28 July 2018

Fragrance of the first rain

Like many, I too love the fragrance of the first rain.  We had some good showers yesterday, exactly after two months - very unusual in the UK.  And the first thing that caught my attention even before I could see the rain was the fragrance of that rain hitting the ground.

Only today did I read something scientific about it - petrichor, that's the name of the fragrance! It is actually caused by a bacteria when the rain hits the earth.  Since I cannot describe (sufficiently) the experience of the fragrance, I might for now learn the scientific chemistry behind it.  The term 'petrichor' was coined by scientists Isabel Joy Bear and Richard Thomas in their 1964 article "Nature of Argillaceous Odour", published in the journal Nature. The word was coined from Greek petros, meaning 'stone', and ichor, meaning 'the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods' More of it here on BBC

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