#uncat 

**Taste buds** (also referred to as **taste papillae**) are sensory organs that enable you to perceive different flavors in food in other words, to taste the food you eat.

They are tiny bumps on the surface of your tongue, and each contains groups of receptor cells that anchor an antenna-like structure called a **microvillus**, which projects up through a gap (or pore) in the centre of the taste bud.

## Flavours
Your taste buds recognize 5 basic flavours:
- sweet
- sour
- bitter
- salty
- umami (richness or a savory flavor associated with glutamate (glutamic acid), the amino acid responsible for the distinctive flavour of soy products)

![[Pasted image 20250703210010.png]]

There's also taste bud patterns to recognize 6 more:
![[Pasted image 20250703225158.png]]
(not conclusively identified)

Some illnesses alter your ability to tase foods:
result = partial or total **ageusia**, or you may experience **flavor confusion**

![[Pasted image 20250703225508.png]]

Some medicines also affect your sense of taste.
![[Pasted image 20250703225838.png]]

"Good" for all human beings: they like sweets, crave salt, go for the fat, and avoid the bitter (or at least at first)

![[Pasted image 20250703231718.png]]
![[Pasted image 20250703231725.png]]

![[Pasted image 20250703233900.png]]

Culturally speaking, people often tend to eat and enjoy:
1) what is easily available, which explains the differences in cuisines in different parts of the world
2) the food must be nutritious and relatively easy or economical to produce


Dislking certain flavours:
![[Pasted image 20250703234656.png]]
![[Pasted image 20250703234735.png]]
![[Pasted image 20250703234820.png]]