Georg Meissner and Rudolf Wagner, nineteenth-century German
scientists, were the first to discover that taste buds exist. They also found
that taste buds wear out every week to ten days and are replaced with new
ones. After the age of forty-five, our taste buds are not replaced as
frequently. As a result, the level of flavor intensity would need to be
stronger for someone who is middle-aged than for someone in his or her
youth.
The average adult has approximately 10,000 taste buds which can be
grouped into different types of taste, including sweet, bitter, sour, and
salty. A person tastes sweet things on the tip of the tongue, bitter foods on
the back of the tongue, and sour flavors on the sides of the tongue. Salty
foods are tasted primarily on the front of the tongue but may be
experienced all over the tongue.
The presence of the sweet taste buds at the tip of the tongue may explain
why certain bitter flavors are an acquired taste. The taste of bitter flavors