Researchers have discovered that chemical eruptions from the tiny bubbles in a glass of champagne release flavour in the form of aerosols hovering above the liquid. In a paper in PNAS (doi: 10.1073/pnas.0906483106), Gérard Liger-Belair and colleagues used ultra-high resolution mass spectrometry to analyse the aerosols in champagne and identified the different chemical fingerprints in aerosols released after champagne is poured, compared with the liquid portion of the drink.

The authors indicate that the aerosols contained an over-concentration of compounds known to be aromatic. These compounds tend to be "surface active substances" or surfactants, double-ended compounds that contain one end that is attracted to water and another that shuns it. The researchers suggest that the surfactants clump onto champagne bubbles with one end inside the bubble and the other in the liquid. The bubbles then drag the compounds along as they rise to the surface of the glass and, when the bubbles pop, they release the aromatic compounds as aerosols. This study supports the idea that champagne bubbles do more than tickle your nose—they continually lift aromas to the surface of every glass.

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