New device could allow you to taste cake in virtual reality

Novel technology aims to alter the virtual reality experience by introducing a new sensory connection: taste.

The 'e-Taste' interface employs sensors and wireless chemical dispensers to enable remote taste perception, often known as gestation. Field testing done by researchers at The Ohio State University confirmed the device's ability to digitally simulate a range of taste intensities while still offering variety and safety for the user.

These sensors are calibrated to distinguish glucose and glutamate molecules, representing the five basic tastes: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and umami. Once collected via an electrical signal, the data is wirelessly transmitted to a remote device for replication.

"The chemical dimension in the current VR and AR realm is relatively underrepresented, especially when we talk about olfaction and gustation," said Jinghua Li, co-author of the study and an assistant professor of materials science and engineering at Ohio State. "It's a gap that needs to be filled and we've developed that with this next-generation system."

The system, whose development was inspired by previous biosensor work of Li's, utilizes an actuator with two parts: an interface to the mouth and a small electromagnetic pump. This pump connects to a liquid channel of chemicals that vibrates when an electric charge passes through it, pushing the solution through a special gel layer into the mouth of the subject.

Depending on the length of time that the solution interacts with this gel layer, the intensity and strength of any given taste can easily be adjusted, said Li.

"Based on the digital instruction, you can also choose to release one or several different tastes simultaneously so that they can form different sensations," she said.

The study was published today in the journal Science Advances.

Taste is a subjective sense that can change from one moment to another. Yet this complex feeling is the product of two of the body's chemical sensing systems working in tandem to ensure what you eat is safe and nutritious, the gustation and the olfactory (or smell) senses.

"Taste and smell are greatly related to human emotion and memory," said Li. "So our sensor has to learn to capture, control and store all that information."

Despite the difficulty involved in replicating similar taste sensations for a majority of people, researchers found that in human trials, participants could distinguish between different sour intensities in the liquids generated by the system with an accuracy rate of about 70%. (ANI)

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