Contact: Karen Kreeger
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University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine

Energy Molecule Transmits 3 Types of Taste to the Brain

Caption: Taste buds in a circumvallate papilla in a mouse tongue with types I, II and III taste cells visualized by cell-type-specific fluorescent antibodies. Type II cells respond to sweet, bitter, and umami tastes by signaling to the central nervous system by non-vesicular ATP release. Taruno and colleagues have identified CALHM1 as a voltage-gated ATP release channel that mediates this response to these taste modalities.

Credit: Aki Taruno, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania; Nature

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Related news release: How the body's energy molecule transmits 3 types of taste to the brain