The Sense of Taste: Of genes, molecules and the fascinating biology of one of the most fundamental senses

By Petra Schling

In this essential, Petra Schling gives an overview of the current state of research on the topic of taste. She regards taste as a sensory perception that allows us to distinguish essential food components from toxins. What we eat depends not insignificantly on how we like it. But how do we actually taste - and what do we taste? As omnivores, we humans have a relatively wide range of taste receptors, not only in our mouths, which provide us with important information about our food. Outside the mouth, taste receptors serve our innate immune system to "taste" bacteria, worms and other intruders. We can and should rely on this. Our sense of taste warns us of toxins and unwanted co-inhabitants and can only be deceived to a very limited extent by sweeteners, bitter blockers or similar tricks.
This Springer essential is a translation of the original German 1st edition essentials,Der Geschmack by Petra Schling, published by Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature in 2021.The translation was done with the help of artificial intelligence (machine translation by the service DeepL.com). A subsequent human revision was done primarily in terms of content, so that the book will read stylistically differently from a conventional translation. Springer Nature works continuously to further the development of tools for the production of books and on the related technologies to support the authors.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Springer
• Release date: Aug 28, 2021
• ISBN: 9783658322335

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Book cover of The Sense of Taste

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Petra Schling

The Sense of Taste

Of genes, molecules and the fascinating biology of one of the most fundamental senses

1st ed. 2021

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Petra Schling

Biochemie-Zentrum, Universität Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany

ISSN 2197-6708e-ISSN 2197-6716

essentials

ISSN 2731-3107e-ISSN 2731-3115

Springer essentials

ISBN 978-3-658-32232-8e-ISBN 978-3-658-32233-5

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-32233-5

© Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2021

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Preface

This essential is based on lectures for students of biology and medicine and at children’s universities, which I have been allowed to give for about 10 years. Of course, this text is much more detailed than a 2 h lecture could ever be. Please do not be put off by the many abbreviations. You only need to know them if you are more intensively interested in one of the molecules. The information presented here is not from my own research but has all been compiled from publications by others. You can find them in the bibliography. My thanks go to the authors of these articles, without them this essential would never have been possible. However, the current scientific understanding of how things are can only ever be a snapshot. Scientific facts are constantly being reviewed by critical people and often refuted by them. What today is regarded as certain knowledge may be outdated tomorrow. This essential is intended to give you an overview of the current state of research into taste. However, its statements are not set in stone and certainly carry my very personal subjective note. I would, therefore, be pleased to receive any comments you may have on the text. Only through your critical view can a further edition come still closer to the truth.

The topic of taste is of course closely linked to nutrition. And when it comes to the topic of nutrition, there are often fierce discussions about good and evil, right and wrong, far removed from scientific findings. In this context, food is often an important means of forming identity and distinguishing oneself from others (Klotter 2016). In this essential, however, taste and thus also nutrition should be considered from the biological necessity to distinguish essential food components from toxins. Chemistry is not a bad thing and organic is not a good thing. Whether a molecule was produced in a chemical laboratory or by a living being, whether it was purified (crystal sugar) or not (natural sugar in fruit juice), changes nothing about the molecule and its effect. The only criterion for bio is that the molecule has been synthesized by a living being. However, nature has invented the strongest poisons of all, and plants and animals do not want to be eaten by us. Chemistry in food has made it safer (DKFZ 2016) and is causing a continous fall in new cases of stomach cancer and mortality rates (Robert Koch Institute 2017). Genetic engineering and other genetic modifications have turned toxic plants into edible food. There is no doubt that the food industry has not only produced good things. For example, the greening of canned vegetables was banned as early as 1887 because of the known toxicity of the copper sulfate used. In 1928 it was permitted again so that the domestic vegetables did not look so colorless next to the competition from