Why does the taste change after brushing teeth?

If you like orange juice and if you've ever tried drinking it right after brushing your teeth, you must have remembered that the sweet taste of your favorite drink turned into something very bitter. If you were wondering why this change is happening in the first place, you are about to get the answer to that question.

Sensory bodies, which are located on the surface of the tongue, participate in the creation of taste. There are about 5.000 of these corpuscles and they are unevenly distributed on the surface of the tongue. Their role is to recognize 5 different tastes: sweet, salty, bitter, sour and umami (which we wrote about). Each of these bodies is specialized for a certain taste and can only detect it.

It used to be believed that the taste of sweet is detected only on the tip of the tongue, salty and sour on the sides, while the taste of bitter is registered on the base of the tongue. However, this understanding has been proven to be incorrect.

Today it is known that all tastes are registered on the entire surface of the tongue.

Another factor that affects the change in taste after brushing teeth is the toothpaste itself. Namely, the four main ingredients of toothpaste are: water (which gives the appropriate consistency to the paste), abrasives (which are used to remove deposits from the teeth), fluoride (which is used to prevent breakdowns) and detergent (which facilitates the removal of food residues). Sodium laureth sulfate (NLS) is used as the most common detergent. This compound is also used in other personal hygiene products, such as shampoos, baths, soaps, etc. It is NLS that is responsible for the change in taste when it is in the mouth.

The mechanism of taste change is based on the fact that NLS inhibits sensory bodies that detect sweet. In addition to this effect, NLS destroys phospholipids, which are found in our mouths.

As phospholipids play an important role in the inhibition of bitter taste, it is through their destruction that the bitter taste becomes fully expressed. The combination of these two effects, reducing the sensation of sweet and increasing the sensation of bitter, leads to that very bitter taste you get in your mouth when you drink orange juice right after brushing your teeth.

(www.mojstomatolog.net)

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