Lily of The Valley - Lily of The Valley Phenomenon

Lily of The Valley Phenomenon

See also: bourgeonal

The odor of lily of the valley, specifically the ligand bourgeonal, attracts mammal sperm in a dramatic manner. The 2003 discovery of this phenomenon prompted a new wave of research into odor reception, but no evidence was found that the female sex organ has similar odors of any kind. A 2012 study demonstrated instead that at high concentrations, bourgeonal imitated the role of progesterone in stimulating sperm to swim (chemotaxis), a process unrelated to odor reception.

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Famous quotes containing the words lily of the, lily of, lily, valley and/or phenomenon:

    “I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys. As a lily among brambles, so is my love among maidens. As an apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among young men. With great delight I sat in his shadow, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.”
    —Bible: Hebrew, Song of Solomon 2:1-3.

    “I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys.”
    —Bible: Hebrew The Song of Solomon (l. II, 1)

    “Rejoice with the day lily for it is born for a day to live by the mailbox and glorify the roadside”
    —Anne Sexton (1928–1974)

    “The wide wonder of Broadway is disconsolate in the daytime; but gaudily glorious at night, with a milling crowd filling sidewalk and roadway, silent, going up, going down, between upstanding banks of brilliant lights, each building braided and embossed with glowing, many-coloured bulbs of man-rayed luminance. A glowing valley of the shadow of life. The strolling crowd went slowly by through the kinematically divine thoroughfare of New York.”
    —Sean O’Casey (1884–1964)

    “If you could choose your parents,... we would rather have a mother who felt a sense of guilt—at any rate who felt responsible, and felt that if things went wrong it was probably her fault—we’d rather have that than a mother who immediately turned to an outside thing to explain everything, and said it was due to the thunderstorm last night or some quite outside phenomenon and didn’t take responsibility for anything.”
    —D.W. Winnicott (20th century)