title: Taste confusions following gymnemic acid rinse.
abstract: The effect of a gymnemic acid (GA) rinse, which simulated a sweet-taste deficit, was measured on human taste perception and identification. Taste ratings showed that GA reduced the intensities of sucrose and aspartame to 14% of pre-rinse levels; over the recovery interval of 30 min, these values increased linearly to 63% of the pre-rinse levels. Repeated presentations of a set of 10 stimuli (five primarily or partly sweet--sucrose, aspartame, and NaCl-sucrose, acid-sucrose and quinine-sucrose mixtures; and five nonsweet--NaCl, KCl, Na glutamate (MSG), quinine HCl and citric acid) for identification following water and GA rinses produced 'taste confusion matrices' (TCMs). Correct identification of the sweet-tasting stimuli was reduced by 23% in presentations closely following the GA rinse, an effect that dissipated with time. Most misidentifications involved sucrose and mixtures containing sucrose. In a second TCM experiment, GA was presented frequently within each session to maintain the sweet taste deficit, which revealed itself as specific confusions. Rinsing with GA impaired discriminability of sweet-nonsweet pairs of stimuli but enhanced discriminability of the aspartame-(NaCl-sucrose) pair. GA had no effect on discriminability of nonsweet stimulus pairs. The results suggest that specific error patterns in the TCM could be used to identify quality-specific taste disorders.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostructure and Function, University of Connecticut Health Center, Farmington 06030-3705, USA. gent@neuron.uchc.edu
authors.forename: J F
authors.initials: JF
authors.lastname: Gent
authors.forename: T P
authors.initials: TP
authors.lastname: Hettinger
authors.forename: M E
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Frank
authors.forename: L E
authors.initials: LE
authors.lastname: Marks
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010465:Perception / Q000187:drug effects; D012503:Saponins; D013649:Taste / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000502:physiology; D014315:Triterpenes / Q000494:pharmacology*
chemical_list: D012503:Saponins; D014315:Triterpenes; C007898:gymnemic acid