Titan Arum, or Corpse FlowerI first heard of the Corpse flower when I ran smack into a line awaiting entrance into the US National Arboretum in DC.  One was inside blooming away and emitting a rancid odor.  I was unable to view that particular specimen.  But I was able to see one – in the flesh – last Wednesday at the SF State botanical greenhouse.

This particular specimen was unfortunately not yet in bloom.  The Corpse Flower also known as the Titan Arum is best known for the smell it emits when in bloom.  It only blooms for 24 to 48 hours and it emits a smell that can range from rotting garbage to a dead corpse.  When I viewed it on Wednesday, the petals known as the spathe were wrapped around a very large hollow stem known as a spadix.  On the outside the spathe were green and you could just see the deep burgundy fray of the interior portion of the spathe.  The corpse flower not only emits a rotting meat fragrance when the spathe finally opens.  The flower's deep red or burgundy color and texture mimic the texture and appearance of rotting meat.  Moreover, during bloom the spadix heats up to the about 98 degrees Farenheit, which helps the perfume permeate the air and further seals the illusion of rotting meat.  All these attributes during bloom will then attract carrion-eating beetles and Flesh Flies that it turn pollinate the Corpse Flower in its native tropical forest clime in Sumatra.

After viewing the almost three foot Corpse flower personally, I have been following the daily blog about its progress on the Friend of the Greenhouse at  www.fotgh.com.  The blog has been updated faithfully by the Greenhouse Manager, Martin Marhoot.  Early last week the flower debunked experts by staying closed on the day they had predicted for it to open.  It is further being perplexing by given not a rancid odor but one quite sweet and familiar – that of chocolate!  This morning, which is Friday, July 3^rd as I write this, It started to emit this odor.  The spadix also increased in girth and it looks now like the spathes will relax and open just in time for fourth of July  What kind of scent will waft through Greenhouse is now up for debate.

Last night, I watched a reality dating show with a seemingly wacky way of finding true love. The male searching for love sniffed the armpits of potential females. He either turned away in disgust or became quite aroused by the wafts of underarm aroma. What is so comical is that a new dating service relies on a more sterile but ultimately similar approach. Scientific Match, which opened last December, provides dating services based on both personality and DNA compatibility. Clients send in a cheek swab of DNA to be matched up with a potential mate who has dissimilar DNA.

Attraction based on dissimilar DNA was first studied in 1995 by Claus Wedekind. The study is referred to as the "Sweaty T-Shirt Experiment." In the study, women were given t-shirts recently worn by men. The men in the study were not allowed to wear any cologne or scent that would mask their natural scent. The women were then asked to rate how "sexy" the t-shirts smelled to them. Correlation was found between how good the shirts smelled to the women and how dissimilar their immune DNA was to the man in question. Following this approach, Scientific Match matches clients based on chemistry, specifically making sure six immune genes of each male and female do not match.

But why would it be advantageous to be attracted to someone with dissimilar DNA? Scientifically speaking, it increases the robustness of the species by providing genetic diversity in a gene pool. Diversity enables survival in intense bouts of environmental and infectious selection. There is more of a chance that an individual will have the adaptation to survive and propagate in the population and pass on the advantageous trait. Similar DNA creates a bottleneck in the gene pool because similar genes are passed down rather than diversified – this is the case with inbreeding.

However, basing attraction on chemistry has its drawbacks. Women who are on birth control are turned away from Scientific Match because findings have reported that they are attracted to men with similar immune system genes. Birth controls works by tricking the body in believing it is pregnant. Studies have shown this also changes the indication of genes making women more attracted to family members than potential mates. This behavior has been seen in other mammals and is thought to be a way of protecting a pregnant member of the family and its offspring from harm.

If you meet the qualifications for Scientific Match, you might just find the love of your life for a whopping price tag of a $1,995. That or you can try the more wacky approach of smelling someone's armpits! Either way, companies such as these denote advances in technology. DNA sequencing and comparative genomics have become cutting edge science and they are infiltrating our everyday life. Genetic testing is not only in the dating arena. Swab and send testing kits are being used for other projects such as National Geographic's Genographic Project and 23andMe. Both use DNA to uncover deep roots of family trees by using comparative DNA.

Cat Aboudara is the Special Projects Manager at California Academy of Sciences and works in the public programs division. The Academy is a wonderful fit for her because of her curiosity about the natural world and her experience in working with native California wildlife.