Sweetness
![Sweet foods, such as this [[strawberry](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/Strawberry_shortcake.jpg)
The perceived intensity of sugars and high-potency sweeteners, such as aspartame and neohesperidin dihydrochalcone, are heritable, with gene effect accounting for approximately 30% of the variation.
The chemosensory basis for detecting sweetness, which varies between both individuals and species, has only begun to be understood since the late 20th century. One theoretical model of sweetness is the multipoint attachment theory, which involves multiple binding sites between a sweetness receptor and a sweet substance.
Studies indicate that responsiveness to sugars and sweetness has very ancient evolutionary beginnings, being manifest as chemotaxis even in motile bacteria such as ''E. coli''. Newborn human infants also demonstrate preferences for high sugar concentrations and prefer solutions that are sweeter than lactose, the sugar found in breast milk. Sweetness appears to have the highest taste recognition threshold, being detectable at around 1 part in 200 of sucrose in solution. By comparison, bitterness appears to have the lowest detection threshold, at about 1 part in 2 million for quinine in solution. In the natural settings that human primate ancestors evolved in, sweetness intensity should indicate energy density, while bitterness tends to indicate toxicity. The high sweetness detection threshold and low bitterness detection threshold would have predisposed our primate ancestors to seek out sweet-tasting (and energy-dense) foods and avoid bitter-tasting foods. Even amongst leaf-eating primates, there is a tendency to prefer immature leaves, which tend to be higher in protein and lower in fibre and poisons than mature leaves. The "sweet tooth" thus has an ancient heritage, and while food processing has changed consumption patterns, human physiology remains largely unchanged. Provided by Wikipedia
41
Published: 1970
Superior document: Peoples and cultures of the Middle East an anthropological reader 2
42
Published: 1973
Superior document: 1:250 000 Geological series - Explanatory notes SE/52-4
43
Published: 1972
Superior document: 1:250 000 Geological series - Explanatory notes SD/52-16
44
Other Authors:
“...Sweet, Margo...”
45
Published: 2009.
Superior document: ATLA bibliography series ; no. 57
Links: Get full text
46
Published: [2001]
Superior document: Marquette studies in philosophy ; no. 23
Links: Get full text
47
Other Authors:
“...Sweet, Alec Stone...”
48
Published: 2018.
Superior document: Nursing History and Humanities
49
Published: 2002.
Links: Get full text
50
Published: 2009.
Links: Get full text
51
Published: 1985.
Superior document: Colonial Records of the State of Georgia ; Volume 30
52
Published: 2021.
53
Published: c2007.
Links: Get full text
54
Published: 1988.
Links: Get full text
55
Published: [2014]
Links: Get full text
56
Published: 2003.
Links: Get full text
57
Published: 2010.
Links: Get full text
58
Published: c1996.
Superior document: AIDS prevention and mental health
Links: Get full text
59
Published: 2008.
Links: Get full text
60
Published: c2005.
Links: Get full text