Acute anosmia in the mouse: behavioral discrimination among the four basictaste substances

The importance of taste and smell in discrimination of tastes was examined in normal and anosmic mice. We studied the influence of olfaction on taste sensation using behavioral and electrophysiological methods in both normal animals and animals made anosmic mice by destroying their olfactory recepto r cells with zinc sulfate (ZnSO4) solution. Electrophysiological responses from chorda tympani nerves showed that peripheral taste receptor cells tran smitted taste signals normally to the central nervous system, even when the olfactory senses were abnormal. Behavioral observations showed that mice w ith abnormal olfaction could not differentiate tastes. (C) 2001 Elsevier Sc ience Inc. All rights reserved.