earticle

영어

The ability to taste phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) has been widely used for genetic and anthropological studies. It is known that the human bitter taste receptor hT2R38, in a small region on chromosome 7q, correlates with difference in bitterness recognition of PTC. Human
bitter taste receptors have been identified as G-protein coupled receptor and are thought to be involved in first step of bitter taste recognition. The haplotypes of hT2R38 indicate that the gene
determines PTC sensitivity. In this study, genomic DNAs from taster and non-taster were isolated after taste test with PTC and both types of hT2R38 genes were amplified by PCR. The taster (PAV) and nontaster (AVI) haplotypes of hT2R38 gene with rho-tag, in N-turminus,
were cloned into mammalian cell expression vector and expressed in the membrane of HEK-293 cell. HEK-293 cell expressing PAV type of hT2R38 was responded to PTC without co-expression of G-proteins and AVI type did not. This result indicates that the taste cell mimics human taste system closely. Furthermore, the biological artificial tongue using either human taste receptors or cells expressing taste receptors as a primary transducer is expected to be developed.