Smell a perfume blotter again after some time has passed. A gentle scent, different from the initial impression, may still remain. In that situation, would measuring the amount of fragrance material left on the paper also tell us how long the scent lasts?
In September 2026, a research team from institutions including Université Le Havre Normandie in France investigated two musks used as perfume base notes. Their focus was the relationship between how much remained on paper and how much could be extracted during analysis. The results show why it is important to examine the measurement method before putting numbers on fragrance “longevity.”
How to Measure What Remains on Paper
The compounds studied were ambrettolide and ethylene brassylate. The researchers used a model formulation containing six fragrance materials, adding more volatile compounds and other ingredients to these two musks. The aim was to approximate a perfume containing a mixture of ingredients more closely than measuring musks on their own would.
Two formulations were compared. Both had the same fragrance composition, but one incorporated Longscent, a technology intended to retain fragrance materials. The paper describes a mechanism in which odorless materials form a thin film that slows the evaporation of fragrance ingredients.
The formulations were applied to paper blotters and exposed to air for set periods. The paper was then placed in an analytical instrument and heated, and the compounds released were captured. The captured compounds were separated and examined using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry.
What was measured here was the material that could be recovered from the paper under specified conditions. This was not a direct reproduction of the scent reaching the nose from a blotter at room temperature. Even the initial extraction conditions involved heating at 80°C for 30 minutes, so these measurements need to be distinguished from everyday use.
One Measurement Does Not Recover Everything
In the first experiment, compounds were extracted 15 minutes after the formulation had been applied to the paper. For both musks, the formulation containing Longscent produced a smaller analytical signal, which serves as an indicator of the amount detected.
Taken alone, this might appear to mean that less fragrance material was present on the paper. However, another possible reason for less material entering the instrument is that it remained on the paper but was difficult to extract.
The researchers therefore analyzed the same paper again under identical conditions. Musks were detected in the second analysis too. The first analysis alone had not recovered all the material present on the paper.
For ambrettolide, adding the signals from the two extractions gave similar totals for formulations with and without the technology. Even when the proportion extracted initially was smaller, there appears to have been a fraction that could be recovered in the next extraction.
For ethylene brassylate, however, the combined signal from the two extractions remained smaller in the formulation containing the technology. The researchers considered the possibility that a fraction that could not be extracted under these conditions was strongly retained on the paper. Even compounds used for the same purpose as musks are not recovered in the same way during analysis.
Checking What Is Left Behind
To examine this interpretation, the team also tested longer extraction at a higher temperature. They changed the heating conditions to 150°C for 45 minutes to investigate a method that would leave less material behind.
In the experiment checking recovery under the more stringent conditions, neither of the two target compounds was detected on re-extraction. The researchers concluded that this method could adequately recover the compounds remaining on the paper.
They then examined paper immediately after application, after 2 hours, and after 8 hours. Both musks decreased over time, but after 8 hours, more remained in the formulation containing the technology.
A smaller signal under the initial conditions does not contradict the finding that more material remained on the paper after time had passed. Difficulty of extraction contributes to the former result; the latter compares retention after checking the recovery method. Considering the measurement conditions changes the meaning of the same finding of a “smaller signal.”
The Amount Remaining and the Longevity People Perceive
So how many hours longer does this technology make a perfume smell? This experiment cannot answer that question.
The study examined two musks in a model formulation applied to paper. It was not a test in which the formulation was applied to human skin and participants rated scent intensity over time. The paper also reports checking that no odor remained on the paper after extraction, but that is distinct from a sensory test measuring fragrance longevity during wear.
Even if molecules remain on paper, further investigation is needed to determine how much enters the air and how people perceive it. Retention is an important clue when considering longevity, but the amount remaining cannot by itself be converted into scent intensity or duration. Whether the results obtained on paper would also apply to skin remains unverified.
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. At the same time, the coauthors include employees of Expressions Parfumées, the company that provides Longscent. When interpreting the results, it is worth keeping in mind that this was collaborative research with a company evaluating a specific technology.
Summary
When little fragrance material can be extracted from paper, that does not necessarily mean that little remains on the paper itself. In this study, checking the recovery conditions made it possible to compare retention between formulations without confusing difficulty of extraction with a small amount remaining. After paper treated with the test formulations had been left in air for 8 hours, more of both musks remained when fragrance-retaining materials were added than when they were not.
To reach the human nose, however, the remaining compounds must enter the air. This study established how readily they remained on paper; it did not measure how many hours people could perceive the scent. Distinguishing retention from ease of extraction during analysis provides a basis for more appropriately comparing how fragrance-retaining technologies work within a formulation.
Original Study
Catherine Malhiac, Charbel Hawko, Jennifer Buzzi, Haris Laghouati, Christophe Marin, Géraldine Savary
Tracking Base Note Persistence in Fragrances by Time-Resolved Analysis: Revealing Ingredient Contributions
Flavour and Fragrance Journal, 2026, 1–8. First published September 8, 2026.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/ffj.70155
Full text: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ffj.70155
Original study license: Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY)
This article is an independent explanation based on the findings of the original study. No figures or tables from the original study have been reproduced.
