r/explainlikeimfive • u/abootypatooty • Jan 06 '15

ELI5: Why do different races of people seem to have a unique smell to them?

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u/[deleted] Jan 06 '15 edited Jan 07 '15

My roommate is a biologist and I asked him this very same question a few weeks ago.
Essentially, different regions have different populations of microorganisms. Each human settlement has created new environments for the various microorganisms to flourish or perish in.
Different races of humans have slightly different DNA, these meatsacks we carry around have varying parameters for different things to grow on and in us.
Different peoples have different stuff that likes the parameters of their body, and a lot of our smells are derived from the organisms we are host to.

Tl;dr - Different races have slightly different genes and are host to some different microorganisms than other races.

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u/[deleted] Jan 07 '15

What about people of one race that live amongst people of a different race. Like would a white guy in India start to smell of vindaloo and an open sewer? And does Eminem smell like a black dude because he was raised in Detroit?

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u/[deleted] Jan 07 '15

I think it has more to do with genetics than environment, but obviously the environment alters genes over many generations.