Which sense is most directly linked to the brain’s strongest memory-triggering pathway?

Smell has a uniquely direct route to brain regions involved in memory and emotion. Olfactory information interacts closely with the amygdala and hippocampus, which helps explain why scents can trigger powerful, vivid recollections. This is sometimes called the Proust effect after the writer Marcel Proust, who described memory awakened by smell. Compared with other senses, odor can produce especially emotional and autobiographical memories. That close brain connection makes smell unusually evocative.