Sweet and bitter taste in the brain of awake behaving animals

The taste evaluates the nutritional content of the food, guides the basic appetite behavior, prevents ingestion of toxic substances, and helps to ensure a healthy diet. Sweetness and bitterness are the two most sensible perceptions of humans and other animals; sweetness can distinguish energy-rich nutrients and bitterness prevents the ingestion of potentially toxic chemicals I can do something 1. In mammals, information from tongue taste receptor cells is transmitted to the main taste cortex 2 in the brain via multiple neural stations. Recent imaging studies have shown that neurons organized in a spatial map show sweetness and bitterness in primary taste cortex 3, 4. Each is coded by a different cortical region 4. Here we show that by manipulating the areas of the brain representing sweetness and bitter taste, we directly control the animal's internal ability, perception, and behavioral behavior. These results confirm the segregation of the taste quality in the cortex, demonstrate the essential nature of appetite and aversion to the taste response, demonstrate the ability of the taste cortex to reproduce complex behaviors without sensory input There.

Special thanks to H. Fischman and R. Lessard for advice and comments from members of Zuker Lab. D. Salzman, K. I also appreciate it. Discussion by Scott and R. Axel. This study was funded by C. S. Z of the National Institute for Drug Abuse (DA 035025) and the National Institutes of Health, National Dental Craniofacial Facility (N.J.P.R.). C. S. Z is a researcher at Howard Hughes Medical Research Institute and a senior researcher at Janner Farm Research Institute at Howard Hughes Medical Research Institute.

In a recent study published in Nature on Wednesday they reported that neurons from the brain taste cortex with bitter or sweet taste information take a different approach to how to integrate and adjust the amygdala, emotion Pointed out. In a series of experiments using famous area mouse, they showed that this information can be used to eliminate the positive implications of sweetness and the negative meaning of bitterness. In previous work, in order to test the understanding of how the information is marked as sweet or bitter, researchers rewired the mouse and when the bitter taste felt the animal's sweet neurons were activated It was made to be done. As a result, these mice willingly drink water containing bitter substances. The team could even react to other mice as if they had already bitter liquids - wiped their muzzle fiercely as if they had removed the taste by inducing their bitter neurons without drinking anything What is it?

Zuker's research team previously indicated that the receptor on the tongue signals one of five tastes - sweet, bitter, salty, sour, and umami. It is a specific part of the cortex. Areas responsible for higher cognitive functions. Different taste regions or taste cortices receive inputs from different types of receptors and create dedicated regions for each taste. Direct stimulation of these neurons with photosensitizing proteins activated by fiber optic cables - a technique called optogenetics - makes the mouse behave as if it were experiencing a particular taste. "If you simply activate hundreds of cells in the bitter layer, the animals will not only think that it is bitter, they will do all the relevant actions such as vomiting, cleansing of the mouth," Zuker said. "The information from there is your brain"

The taste evaluates the nutritional content of the food, guides the basic appetite behavior, prevents ingestion of toxic substances, and helps to ensure a healthy diet. Sweetness and bitterness are the two most sensible perceptions of humans and other animals; sweetness can distinguish energy-rich nutrients and bitterness prevents the ingestion of potentially toxic chemicals I can do something 1. In mammals, information from tongue taste receptor cells is transmitted to the main taste cortex 2 in the brain via multiple neural stations. Recent imaging studies have shown that neurons organized in a spatial map show sweetness and bitter taste in the primary taste cortex 3, 4 The quality of each flavor is coded by different cortical areas 4