Discrimination of Umami Tastants Using Carbon Nanotube-Based Bioelectronic Tongue Mimicking Insect Taste Systems

We report a carbon nanotube-based bioelectronic tongue mimicking insect taste systems for the discrimination of umami tastants. In this work, nanovesicles including honeybee umami taste receptors were hybridized on a carbon nanotube field-effect transistor (CNT-FET) with floating electrodes to construct a bioelectronic tongue. This bioelectronic tongue enabled us to detect L-monosodium glutamate (MSG) with a high sensitivity and discriminate between MSG from non-umami tastants. Furthermore, it could also be utilized to directly detect umami tastants in liquid food such as chicken stock. Importantly, we could quantitatively evaluate the synergistic effects between MSG and disodium 5'-inosinate (IMP) using our platform. This bioelectronic tongue mimicking insect taste systems can be an effective strategy as an artificial taste sensor, providing broad opportunities for basic studies on animal taste systems and various applications in food industries.