What Is the Taste of Mummy?

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Researchers were racing to find the genes that coded these receptors for all the tastes. Umami was accepted around the world as basic taste number five. But in pushing the scientific understanding of taste beyond the big four, umami opened up a whole new world. How many tastes could be out there? Are there just five basic down? Or could there be ay more?

For thousands of years, there have been four basic tastes recognized across cultures. But thanks to Kumiko Ninomiya (aka the Umami Mama), scientists finally accepted a fifth. As part of its Making Sense series, Vox’s Unexplainable podcast explores whether there could be even more.

This episode was reported and produced by Meradith Hoddinott and edited by Katherine Wells, Noam Hassenfeld, Brian Resnick with help from Mandy Nyugen and Byrd Pinkerton. Music by Noam. Cristian Ayala handled the mixing and sound design. Research and fact checking by Richard Sima. Tori Dominguez is our audio fellow.

Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained

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