A sixth basic taste may join sweet, salty, sour, bitter and umami on the tongue
Japanese scientist Kikunae Ikeda first proposed umami as a basic taste — in addition to sweet, sour, salty and bitter — in the early 1900s. About eight decades later, the scientific community officially agreed with him.
Now, scientists led by researchers at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences have evidence of a sixth basic taste.
In research published Oct. 5 in Nature Communications, USC Dornsife neuroscientist Emily Liman and her team found that the tongue responds to ammonium chloride through the same protein receptor that signals sour taste.
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