• Question: why do farts smell

    Asked by 08swebster to Hugh, Antonia, Douglas, Matt, Tom on 14 Jun 2010 in Categories: . This question was also asked by cheesybillybob, thethreelions, iizninja.
    • Photo: Matthew Hurley

      Matthew Hurley answered on 13 Jun 2010:

      Bacteria make gases when they feed off the food we’ve eaten. This makes that ‘smell’. You can smell it when you grow ‘gut bacteria’ in a petri dish.

    • Photo: Antonia Hamilton

      Antonia Hamilton answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      well your nose is sensitive to lots of things, especially things that can be good or bad to eat. That includes being sensitive to the smell of poo and urine so that you can avoid eating them. I guess farts smell just because they come from the same place.

    • Photo: Tom Hardy

      Tom Hardy answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      It’s all to do with decomposition. A little bit like why a compost pile in your gargen might smell. When you eat food and your body digests the food it gets broken down, during the break down gases such as nitrogen, carbon dioxide, oxygen, methane, and hydrogen sulfide are produced as part of the naturally occuring reactions inside you. It is the hydrogen sulfide and other compunds that make released gases smell bad.

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