A $2 million federal grant for research on how neurons in the mouth interact with the brain has been awarded to an Eastern Michigan University neuropsychologist and his partner. The research will explain for the first time how the brain responds to the different things you’ve been putting in your mouth.
Joseph Breza says he is sharing the $2 million National Institute of Health grant with his research partner at the University of Louisville. Together, they hope to better identify the neuron types on taste buds and then determine how those neurons interact with taste neurons in the brainstem.
“And if they do which neuron types? Are they broad? Or are they affecting sweet neuron types more than salt neuron types for example.”
Breza expects their research might eventually allow other scientists to address such questions as what is happening when people lose their sense of taste during a medical situation. He says there is also great interest in this research from the food-making industry.
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