Where Can You Taste It?

Presented by: Jessica Biviano, Camille Giordano, Allison Gross

 

     

     It is a common belief that you can only taste certain flavors on certain parts of your tongue.  This, however, is not true.  There are taste receptors all over your tongue, each of which can detect all flavors. 


 


    Take a piece of the sour candy and place it in your mouth.  Wait ten seconds and sense the sour taste moving across your whole tongue, not just the receptor areas labeled sour on the diagram above.


FACT

 


    Once these taste receptors are activated, a message is sent to your brain that tells you what you are tasting.


 

 http://www.aafp.org/afp/20000115/427.html

 

 

 

 Name That Flavor

Did you know that if you block your sense of smell, you also block your sense of taste?  Your senses of smell and taste work together to detect specific tastes which assist in detecting certain odors.
Materials:
  1. Jellybeans
  2. Water
Steps:
  1. Eat a jellybean and state the flavor 
  2. Take a sip of water to cleanse your pallet
  3. You will be blindfolded and given another jellybean to eat while holding your nose

Can you taste a flavor now?


Are You A Taster?

  Being a taster, allows you detect genetic differences in tasting abilities.  Taste receptors are located on taste buds which are more numerous on the Fungiform Papillae.  The Carolina Biological Taste Strips contain three different kinds of taste papers, which allow you to know if you are a taster or not. 

  1. Control Papers: These taste strips taste like paper
  2. Phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) Taste Paper: If there is a bitter taste then you are a taster of PTC.  If there is no taste, then you are not a taster.
  3. Sodium Benzoate Taste Paper: If sweet, salty or bitter taste reactions occur, then you are a taster.  If there is no taste, then you are not a taster
  4. Thiourea Taste Paper: If you have a bitter taste, then you are a taster of thiourea.  If there is no taste, then you are not a taster

Steps:

  1. Take a sip of water to cleanse you pallat
  2. Put one of the three taste strips on your tongue
  3. Some may taste it, some may not 
  4. Take another sip of water to cleanse your pallat

http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/bitter.html

 Taster/Nontaster

PTA

Carolina Biological Taste Strips

http://faculty.uca.edu/~jmurray/baw2004/taste.pdf