A Special Lecture “Unlocking the Secret of the Fifth Taste” held for students from Augustana University
January 2025
On January 21, 2025, the Umami Information Center (UIC) welcomed 12 students from Augustana University in South Dakota, USA.
They are the students studying with Dr. Barrett Eichler, Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Augustana Univ., who came to UIC as part of “The Chemistry of Japanese Culture”, a course investigating the science of Japanese cuisine.
Professor Eichler's course studies the aspects of chemistry that are unique to Japan, with visits to Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, and Okinawa. There they investigated a wide range of chemistry inherent in Japanese culture, from food culture like wasabi, sake brewing to the chemical industry like indigo dyeing.
“Umami is a great example - discovered in Japan, is a big part of food culture, even has a Japanese word for the sensation of umami.” Professor Eichler says, “What we would really like to know is - how are umami and chemistry related? I know glutamate, inosinate, and guanylate are important players in umami flavors, but how? I hope that my students will learn a little bit about the chemical structures and the biochemistry that goes into umami.”
Upon request from the professor, a special lecture, “Unlocking the Secret of the Fifth Taste,” was held at the UIC office. The lecturer was Dr. Kumiko Ninomiya, a UIC consultant and umami researcher.
Since the students were majoring in chemistry and biochemistry, the lectures were more science oriented. In addition to the usual umami basics, Dr. Ninomiya explained the chemical structures of the three umami compounds (glutamate, inosinate, and guanylate) and how nucleotides are produced by RNA degradation.
She also told some of the areas of research being conducted recently, including the fact that glutamate is also perceived in our digestive system.
After that, she conducted a tasting session using foods containing glutamate, inosinate, and guanylate to let students not only know umami as knowledge but also experience umami as a taste sensation.
During the Q&A session, some asked questions about how to read the charts and graphs in the lecture material, and also about whether the spiciness of wasabi (Japanese horseradish) is a taste sensation - a question related to the Japanese food ingredients investigated during their study tour in Japan.
In his email after returning to the US, Prof. Eichler told us that it was the most science (chemical structures, proteins, amino acids, etc.), that they have seen in Japan since they have been there and that the students really enjoyed it.
We were impressed by the way the students from the American university tried to find the universal truth of chemistry in Japanese food culture, which seems so peculiar.