Case No. 129 · the exotic forty · have you seen this molecule?

2-Nonenal

the smell of turning forty

File sealed

The detectives are still writing this one up. The poster and the facts are below; the film and the interrogation room open soon.

Booking photographs

2-Nonenal, front view, against a height chart in nanometers — FRONT

2-Nonenal, side view — SIDE · CID 5283335

The suspect, from its real atomic coordinates. Drag to turn it. Height chart in nanometers, ruled every 0.05 nm. A quarter is about 21 million times wider.

Rap sheet

Answers to: trans-2-Nonenal. In Japan, the smell of aging is called kareishu.
Height: 1.2 nm, standing on end.
Weight: 0.23 zeptograms
Smell: Greasy and grassy.
Origins: Omega-7 fats in skin oil, oxidized. Both rise with age.
Habits: Latches onto lysines in proteins.
Associates: Stale beer, as the cardboard taste.
Alibi: A lab in Philadelphia looked for it on 25 people and found none.
Last seen: In the back of a T-shirt worn three days by someone over forty.

6,200,000,000,000,000,000

of them in a pound of fresh cucumbers, none of them forty.
Cucumbers vary. You’ve never seen one.

CASE FILE: Haze, S. et al. (2001) 2-Nonenal Newly Found in Human Body Odor Tends to Increase with Aging. Journal of Investigative Dermatology 116, 520–524.

The poster on the street

This is the photocopied wanted poster for 2-Nonenal, No. 129 of the exotic forty. They were made for noticeboards around Boston, Cambridge and the rest of the east coast.

Found one? Scan its QR code with your phone. If you're a signed-in player, the sighting goes on your record with +1 XP.

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