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Taste Buds & Scientific Experiments

Rows of tiny taste buds take credit every time someone enjoys a flavorsome meal. But scientists say those little bumps known as papillae can take only some of the glory, because your salivary glands and nose work in tandem with your tongue to make you say "yum." Learning about taste buds and scientific experiments demonstrates the complexities that go on inside your mouth, which, if typical, houses 184 taste buds per square centimeter, according to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.

  1. Texture

    • Slice a potato, apple and onion, and then wrap a blindfold around a friend's eyes. Place a sliver of potato on the center of her tongue and instruct your friend to identify the little chunk without chewing. Try the same experiment with the piece of apple and then the onion. Watch her struggle to recognize those three distinct edible items, because the tongue's center has fewer taste buds, making foods tougher to taste if you use only your most central buds.

    Tongue

    • Assemble liquids that are bitter, sweet, sour and salty. Use onion juice for bitterness, sugar water for sweetness, saltwater to represent saltiness, and vinegar as a sour substance. Dip a toothpick into one of the liquids and gently tap it along your tongue. Repeat this with all the items. Notice how you detect the sugared water only at the tip of your tongue. Buds on the front side taste saltiness, and sourness is detected only on the rear side of the tongue. The back of the tongue tastes bitterness.

    Saliva

    • Taste buds rely on saliva to break down foods. Tiny receptors buried inside each bud detect different flavors. Rub your tongue with a clean paper towel so that the surface feels dry. Sample some grains of salt or sugar, or nibble on something dry, like a cracker. After each item, sip some water and dry your tongue again. Observe how you are not only dabbing away the saliva, but also temporarily diminishing your sense of taste.

    Cleansing

    • Spittle does more than lubricate your taste buds and enhance your ability to taste. Saliva also acts as a cleanser. Chomp on some blueberries, and observe the dark discoloration of your tongue. Your mouth constantly churns out saliva that gradually rinses away stains and food particles on all those taste cells. Throughout your lifetime, your oral cavity will produce about 10,000 gallons of saliva, according to the Franklin Institute.

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