Stinky feet are embarrassing, to say the least, but foot odor is only natural. If a person can sweat, then their feet can produce a pungent odor. However, that doesn’t mean everyone has to walk around with stink bombs in their socks. A video uploaded by Reactions and produced by The American Chemical Society explains what exactly causes foot odor and what we can do to prevent that smell from permeating through our Nikes.

Our feet are home to the highest concentration of sweat glands on our bodies. The fact that most people wear socks and shoes on a daily basis only helps to trap in all that sweat. This abundance of sweat coupled with four connected factors, including warmth, moisture, source of oxygen, and source of nutrient, facilitates the growth of bacteria and the production of odorous waste products, including propanoic acid, methanethiol, isovaleric acid.

All is not lost when it comes to stinky feet, and you don’t need a feet sniffing robot dog from Japan to keep your feet from smelling like the inside of a high school boy’s locker room. Consider targeting all three sources of foot odor: sweat, dead skin, and bacteria.

Start by scrubbing your feet with antibacterial soap and removing the dead skin from your feet via a pumice stone or your trusty Ped Egg. Next, make sure you’re wearing new socks each day made of a breathable material, such as cotton. Then air out your shoes. They probably developed their own stink, since you picked them up at Foot Locker a couple of months ago. Last, apply antiperspirant to your feet. It may seem weird, but if it can prevent our armpits from stinking, it can help our feet too.