Tag: windows of knowledge

Gustatory receptors are also called taste receptors. Taste receptors recognize five basic tastes such as salty, sour, sweet, bitter and umami. Salty and sour tastes are detected with the help of ion channels in the tongue. Sweet, bitter, and umami tastes are detected with the help of G protein-coupled taste receptors. 

• The tongue functions as a digestive organ by facilitating the movement of food during mastication and help in swallowing.
•  Other important functions include speech and taste. Our teeth help our tongue to grind food as the tongue mixes the food around your mouth.
•  A dry tongue can't taste a thing, so saliva helps the tongue by keeping it wet. Saliva moistens food and helps to break it down, which makes it easier for the tongue to push the food back to swallow it. 
• Hence, The function of the tongue is to help in the act of swallowing and Help in mixing saliva with the food.
•  So, the correct answer is 'Both A and B'.

Papillae give the tongue its rough texture. The surface of the papillae is covered by thousands of taste buds.
Taste buds have the taste sensors or the taste receptors inside them.
Each taste bud has a cavity with a pore called as the taste pore.
Inside each cavity is taste receptor cells or gustatory receptor cells, bathed in saliva.
Each receptor cell has a free hair-like cilium also called as the taste hair which projects into the outer taste pore.
Additionally, each receptor cell has a nerve fibre called as the gustatory nerve extending from its base to the taste centre of the brain.

A- Papillae contain taste buds. Taste receptors are situated around the papillae. Tastebuds are a combination of basal, structural and taste receptor cells.