Gustatory evoked potential induced by stimulation of solution in human

The evoked potentials for concentrations of solutions of the four qualities of tastes(i.e., sweet, salty, sour, and bitter tastes) were measured. The solution was applied to the chorda tympani nerve located on the left side of the tongue at 20mm from the tip and 15mm left from the center line. The evoked potentials were detected from Cz referred to A1(left lobe) with the ground at the Fpz position. The Maximum potential level and its latency were evaluated. The individual threshold level of concentration of the solutions of four tastes were measured. Artificial saliva was used as a control solution. The evoked positive potentials for four qualities of tastes (i.e., gustatory evokde potentials) were found to be around 150ms by averaging eight responses. The arbitrary concentration of the solutions were presented by the relative concentration, which was the ratio of the arbitrary concentration to the individual threshold level. The characteristic relations between the latency and the relative concentration ;and those between the potential level and the relative concentration were evaluated. These evalutions showed that (1) the latencies for salty and bitter tastes denoted the minimum values due to for the change of relative concentration, and that (2) the latency for sour taste decreased as the relative concentrations increased, while the latency for sweet taste denoted the inverse tendency, Sinificant differences between any two maximum potential levels were not recognized. A response latencies to sucrose were abolished after treatment of tongue by a sweet-suppressing agent.