Somatosensory Factors in Human Taste and Flavor Perception

描述（由申请人提供）：没有比指导和激励选择和消费安全营养食品更重要的感官功能了。这种功能大部分是由嘴和鼻子的感觉系统完成的，它们共同产生食物的味道。尽管研究几乎完全集中在味觉和鼻后嗅觉上，但味道的热、机械和化学成分也很重要。因此，该项目的长期目标是了解体感刺激以何种方式和通过何种机制促进风味感知。与过去的资助时期一样，当前时期的心理物理学研究已经发现了以前未被认识到的温度和触觉对味觉和化学感觉的影响。该项目将重点研究温度对甜味、苦味和口腔化学感觉的差异影响，这对味觉和化学感觉转导的分子和细胞机制具有重要意义。具体来说，Aim 1将测试温度主要通过调节适应的速度和程度来影响甜味的假设，可能是通过改变T1R2- T1R3甜味受体的构象。目的2将探讨阳离子通道TPRM5在热味觉感知现象中的潜在作用及其可能对甜味适应的抵消作用的贡献。目的3将研究温度对苦味感知的不同影响，目的是确定这些影响与苦味转导的不同模式之间的关系，包括TRPM5的可能贡献。最后，Aim 4将测量温度如何影响盐和酸的味觉和化学感觉，其具体目标是测试其化学品质主要通过不同的热敏TRP通道（即TRPV1与TRPA1）引起的假设。总之，这些目标将导致对温度影响味觉和风味的方式的更全面的理解，同时也为主要在动物模型中发展起来的关于人类化学感觉机制的假设提供独特的测试。因此，这种转化研究对于促进我们对人类细胞和分子机制的理解非常重要，这可能会导致解决对饮食和健康产生不利影响的味觉和风味功能障碍的新策略。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): There is no more vital sensory function than guiding and motivating the selection and consumption of safe and nutritious foods. Much of this function is carried-out by the sensory systems of the mouth and nose which together give rise to the flavor of foods. Although research has focused almost exclusively on the senses of taste and retronasal olfaction, also important are the thermal, mechanical, and chemesthetic components of flavor. The long-term goal of this project is therefore to understand in what ways and via which mechanisms somatosensory stimuli contribute to flavor perception. As in past funding periods, psychophysical studies in the current period have led to the discovery of previously unrecognized effects of temperature and touch on taste and chemesthesis. The proposed project will focus on differential effects of temperature on sweet taste, bitter taste, and oral chemesthesis that have implications for the molecular and cellular mechanisms of gustatory and chemesthetic transduction. Specifically, Aim 1 will test the hypothesis that temperature affects sweet taste primarily by modulating the rate and degree of adaptation, possibly by changes in conformation of the T1R2- T1R3 sweet taste receptor. Aim 2 will investigate the potential role of the cation channel TPRM5 in the perceptual phenomenon of Thermal Taste and its possible contribution to the counteraction of sweet taste adaptation. Aim 3 will investigate the differentia effects of temperature on bitter taste perception with the goal of determining the relationship of these effects to different modes of bitter taste transduction, including the possible contribution f TRPM5. Finally, Aim 4 will measure how temperature influences the taste and chemesthetic sensations of salts and acids with the specific goal of testing the hypothesis that their chemesthetic qualities are evoked primarily via different thermally-sensitive TRP channels (i.e. TRPV1 vs. TRPA1). Together these aims will lead to a more complete understanding of the ways in which temperature affects taste and flavor, while also providing unique tests of hypotheses about chemosensory mechanisms in humans that have been developed primarily in animal models. Translational research of this kind is therefore important for advancing our understanding of cellular and molecular mechanisms in humans that could lead to new strategies for addressing dysfunctions of taste and flavor that adversely affect diet and health.