Gustology (TASTE) with Dr. Gary Beauchamp

Sweet! Salty! Umami? What’s up with MSG? Why do you like your coffee black? Come down to flavortown and let’s talk tongues. Gustologist Dr. Gary Beauchamp is a chemosensory scientist and an expert in taste. We chat about tastebud flim-flam, celebrity grade hot wings, MSG research, excitotoxins, weaning off sugar, the worst soup on the market, what countries have salt restrictions, why you lost your taste with Covid, how much taste is smell, artificial sweeteners, acquiring a taste for foods, and how a sweet tooth may affect your booze consumption. Delicious facts, served up hot.

Listen via Apple, Spotify, Google, Podbay, Podcast Addict, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Visit Dr. Gary Beauchamp’s Research and Career Highlights and ResearchGate profile 

A donation was made to the Monell Center and Philadelphia Young Playwrights


Links to things we discussed:

Dr. Morley Kare, founder of the Monell Chemical Senses Center

Taste Recognition: Food for Thought

Fruit fly offers lessons in good taste

Cats Lack a Sweet Taste Receptor

Genetics of Taste and Smell: Poisons and Pleasures

Effects of ageing on smell and taste

Pseudogenization of a sweet-receptor gene accounts for cats' indifference toward sugar

Functional Analyses of Bitter Taste Receptors in Domestic Cats (Felis catus)

Dr. Beauchamp on NPR: Cats Can't Taste Sweetness, Study Finds

Cats and Carbohydrates: The Carnivore Fantasy?

Daily/Colbert - Gators Love Marshmallows

Flavor perception in human infants: development and functional significance.

Sensory perception and pleasantness of food flavors in elderly subjects

Early Flavor Learning and Its Impact on Later Feeding Behavior

High salt intake. Sensory and behavioral factors.

Experimental sodium depletion and salt taste in normal human volunteers

Strategies to Reduce Salt Content and Its Effect on Food Characteristics and Acceptance: A Review

Salt Reduction Initiatives around the World

Sodium Reduction Initiatives Across the Globe

Adventures in Diet, Part 1, By Vilhjalmur Stefansson Harper's Monthly Magazine, November 1935.

Vilhjalmur Stefansson, Arctic explorer, ethnologist, lecturer, writer

Differences in dynamic perception of salty taste intensity between young and older adults

WHO’s Sodium Country Score Card

Massive efforts needed to reduce salt intake and protect lives

Target salt 2025: a global overview of national programs to encourage the food industry to reduce salt in foods

Sucralose Promotes Food Intake through NPY and a Neuronal Fasting Response

Aspartame—True or False? Narrative Review of Safety Analysis of General Use in Products

Artificial sweetener is a growing threat for metabolic syndrome: why is extra attention required?

New York Times: We Need More Doctors Who Are Scientists

My Twitter (X?) poll on Diabetic vs. Person-First Language

Congenital sucrase-isomaltase deficiency

Congenital sucrase–isomaltase deficiency: identification of a common Inuit founder mutation

Researchers identify Inuit gene responsible for sugar intolerance

CSID list of sugars and tolerances

Taste buds: cells, signals and synapses

The Low Glutamate Diet Effectively Improves Pain and Other Symptoms of Gulf War Illness

Excitotoxicity via excess glutamate

Dr. Nick Beauchamp on Twitter

Kate Petrova

Smell and Taste Loss Associated with COVID-19 Infection

“This Candle Has No Smell”: Detecting the Effect of COVID Anosmia on Amazon Reviews Using Bayesian Vector Autoregression  

Ethanol Consumption and Taste Preferences in C57BL/6ByJ and 129/J Mice

Radiosurgery

Glutamate: A Safe Nutrient, Not Just a Simple Additive

Natural products as safeguards against monosodium glutamate-induced toxicity

Video: What are Taste Receptors? How Does it Work? Animation


Other episodes you may enjoy:

Diabetology (BLOOD SUGAR)

Felinology (CATS)

Biogerontology (AGING)

Environmental Microbiology (TESTING WASTEWATER FOR DISEASES)

Glycobiology (CARBS)

Laryngology (VOICEBOXES)

Radiology (X-RAY VISION)

Indigenous Culinology (NATIVE COOKING)

Foraging Ecology (EATING WILD PLANTS)

Black American Magirology (FOOD, RACE & CULTURE)

Gastroegyptology (BREAD BAKING)

Entomophagy Anthropology (EATING BUGS)

Mixology (COCKTAILS)


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Editing by Mercedes Maitland of Maitland Audio Productions, Jarrett Sleeper of MindJam Media and Mark David Christenson

Transcripts by Emily White of The Wordary

Website by Kelly R. Dwyer

Theme song by Nick Thorburn

The Human BodyAlie Ward