When Memory Fades, Presence Remains
A speculative system that recreates emotional presence through scent and chemosignals.
Timeline
4 days
Role
Research
UX/UI
Visual Design
Prototyping
Tools
Figma
Figma Make
Team
Joy Zhang
Jason Pham
Hanna Park
Kayan Baig
PROBLEM
Design a speculative tool that reveals an invisible human sensory experience and makes it actionable to support wellbeing.
Who This Is For
Chloe visits her grandmother Barbara every week. Barbara has mid-stage dementia — some days she recognises Chloe, other days she can't place her at all. On those days, she becomes anxious and withdrawn. Not from a lack of love. Her brain simply can't find her.
Good days
“There you are. I've missed you.”
Harder days
"I'm sorry… do I know you?"
Chloe isn't looking for a cure.
She just wants Barbara to feel safe, even when she isn't there.
From that context, we focused on
Olfactioception
The brain's ability to perceive emotional and social signals through scent, entirely without conscious awareness.
How might we use scent-based signals to support emotional connection when memory fails?
This raised a question
What Research Says About Scent
How scent influences emotion and is applied in dementia care
It directly triggers emotion
Unlike sight or hearing, olfactory signals connect directly to the amygdala and hippocampus, triggering emotional responses even when the source can't be consciously recalled.
(Herz, 2004)
1
Evidence in care settings
Olfactory stimulation has been shown to reduce agitation and improve mood in dementia patients.
2
The gap in current practice
Aromatherapy is used occasionally in dementia care, but the scents are generic. They may calm, but they cannot recreate the presence of a specific person.
3
Key Insight
Even without recognition, the body can still respond to emotional cues like scent and chemosignals. Connection can still be felt.
Chemosignals
Invisible chemical cues emitted by the human body that convey emotional states such as comfort, familiarity, and stress without conscious awareness.
What’s missing: personal emotional cues
We're already communicating through scent — we just don't know it.
From research to concept
How our research changed the direction of the project.
Brainstorming Session
Joy
wait, could we combine both scent and chemosignals? so it releases both at the same time
omo this is good for combining them
Hanna
"chemosignals can be combined with environmental aromas... blended with perfumes or environmental scents to influence mood, behavior, and social perception."
First instinct
Scent alone
A device that blends fragrance ingredients to recreate meaningful scents.
→
The realiZation
Missing the invisible
We were only designing for scent, which is just one of the five senses.
→
The evolution
Scent + chemosignals
Combines scent and chemosignals to recreate not just a person's scent, but their presence.
💭
THE CONCEPT
Preserving emotional presence when memory can no longer hold it.
Every existing tool tries to reach the mind. Myos reaches something deeper, the body's ability to feel presence, even when memory is gone.
Why we designed for the caregiver
We made a deliberate decision early on: Myos is not a patient-facing product.
The Patient
Receives the experience
At mid-to-late stages of dementia, managing new technology can be difficult.
Introducing an interface would add confusion, not comfort.
The Caregiver
Drives the interaction
Manages the system. Tracks patterns. Activates presence signatures.
She has the time, the cognitive capacity, and the emotional motivation to use it, and she's the one who can act on what it tells her.
Solution
Three connected components, one seamless experience.
01
Forget-Me-Not
Worn by the caregiver
A small clip worn during visits. With each visit, it builds a stronger record of who you are — not just your scent, but your presence.
Records the chemosignals you naturally emit.
Strengthens with every visit over time.
03
Caregiver App
For caregivers and family only
It activates presence signatures and reveals how emotional connections change over time.
Relationships are visualized as a living garden, where each person appears as a flower and growth reflects connection strength.
Activate presence signatures remotely
See which presences bring the most comfort
Know when a presence may need refreshing
Actively Tracking
Collecting chemosignal data.
Active
Chloe
4h
Barbara’s Garden
5 flowers growing.
Plant Flower
HOME SCREEN
The Garden
Every person whose presence has been captured appears as a flower. Growth reflects connection strength, full bloom reaches Barbara deeply, wilting means it's time to visit.
Actively tracking
The clip is collecting. No action needed.
Active
Sarah
2h
→
View Toggle
Switch between garden and list view.
Plant Flower
Begin capturing someone's presence.
Plant Flower
The Presence Profile
A dedicated view for each presence: its identity, emotional strength, and deployment controls.
Garden
Chloe
DAUGHTER
SCENT
Lily Mist
Stage 4 — Full Bloom
This scent has built a strong memory connection
96%
Myos Status
Emitting Scent
Growth
Check on your flower’s development.
Garden
Myos Status
Emitting Scent
Growth
Check on your flower’s development.
Planted on
03/08/26
Deployed
18 Times
Last Active
Now
Profile
Presence profile analytics. Tones, memories.
Grounding
Calming
Memory-carrying
Chloe’s scent signature is showing a strong connection to memory and comfort. It is often linked to calm, familiarity, and moments of recognition.
Memory Tones
Currently active
Flower Detail
Who the presence belongs to, its scent, and how strong it is.
96% shows how deeply the signature has taken hold.
Growth & Profile
A full picture of how the presence has been used and what emotional qualities it carries.
Memory tones translate scent into something human and readable.
Insights
Which presences reach deepest, which are fading, and when Barbara is most receptive. Surfaced automatically over time.
Deepest Responses
Presences ranked by emotional impact, with the memory tones driving each connection.
Accumulating means the pathway is still growing stronger.
What we’re learning
Patterns emerging from weekly activity.
Deepest Responses
Becoming Distant
These pathways may need more time together to stay open.
Mom
Mother
accumulating
Reaches the deepest place. She hums something no one knows — a melody from a life before us. Whatever she finds there, it brings her home.
Anchoring
Memory-Carrying
Dr. Huo
Caregiver
accumulating
Brings something close to recognition. She once said 'there you are' to an empty room. Late mornings by the window are when the pathway opens widest.
Grounding
Steadying
Joy
The pathway is becoming harder to reach. She still goes somewhere — a faraway look, like standing in a doorway — but it takes longer each time.
✽
Fading is natural —The pathway is still there. More time together with the Forget-Me-Not nearby would help it
blossom again.
Activity &
Recent Responses
Peak receptivity by time of day, plus a live log of how each presence landed.
A guide for when and who to send next.
What we’re learning
Patterns emerging from weekly activity.
When the garden is most active
Morning
72%
Afternoon
58%
Evening
88%
Night
64%
Recent Responses
Show all
Mar 8
7:40pm
Elena
Settled
Easier transition to bed
Mar 8
3:15pm
Zara
Recognition
Mar 7
8:20am
Marcus
Quiet presence
The Forget-Me-Not is building a new signature
These insights will deepen as the garden learns
Design decisions
THE NAME
Myos
From Myosotis — the forget-me-not flower. A symbol of remembrance and connection that endures even as memory fades.
Rather than clinical dashboards, each loved one appears as a flower, making emotional connection visible through growth and care.
Impact
Instead of trying to rebuild memory, Myos preserves presence.
Most assistive technology treats dementia as a cognitive problem. But research shows emotional memory outlasts recognition. Patients can still feel comfort, familiarity, and calm long after they've lost the ability to place a face.
Myos designs for that. By making emotional presence ambient and caregiver-controlled, it gives families a way to reach someone even when words and recognition no longer can.
Designing not for what's lost, but for what remains.
