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Virtual Lemonade: Let's Teleport Your Lemonade!
Abstract
This paper presents a novel methodology to digitally share the flavor experience of a glass of lemonade (or other similar beverages) remotely. The proposed method utilizes a sensor to capture valuable information (primarily, the color and the corresponding pH value) of the lemonade and a customized tumbler to virtually simulate these properties using plain water. Thus, the system consists of three main components: 1) the lemonade sensor, 2) the communication protocol, and 3) a customized tumbler, acting as the lemonade simulator. Initially, the sensor captures the color and the pH value of the lemonade and encodes this information based on an established communication protocol for wireless transmission. On receiving the information from the sensor, the lemonade simulator overlays the color of the drink on plain water using an RGB Light Emitting Diode (LED) and simulates sour taste sensations on the user's tongue via electrical stimulation. An experimental study was conducted to evaluate this novel approach of digitally teleporting a glass of lemonade: 1) to assess the pre-taste perceptions based on the user's visual perceptions of the colors (real vs. virtual lemonade) and 2) to assess the taste sensations (real vs. virtual lemonade). By simulating the experience of drinking a glass of lemonade through the digital reconstruction of the beverage's main visual and taste factors, the results from these experiments will be able to justify the feasibility of teleporting a glass of lemonade using this novel methodology.
... Lemonade [18] pH sensor, RGB sensor, LEDs. Mouth piece with two silver electrodes. ...
... Their results show that participants tasted sourness the most ( 90%), then saltiness ( 70%), bitterness ( 50%), and sweetness ( 5%). In a follow up design, Ranasinghe et al. [18] [19] integrated this stimulation approach into a bottle that augments the taste sensation by: (1) superimposing virtual colours onto the drink using Light Emitting Diodes (LED) and (2) applying weak and controlled electrical stimulation on the tongue. ...
... While the chemical approach is less invasive than the electrical and thermal stimulation of the tongue, it has the disadvantage of requiring continuous fresh preparation and refill of taste stimuli. Electrical and thermal stimulation allow for more control and replication of taste stimuli over a long period of time and over distance (e.g., such as in Taste/IP [16] or virtual lemonade [18]). However, the spectrum of potential taste sensations that can be stimulated through this approach are still limited. ...
Gustatory interfaces have gained popularity in the field of human-computer interaction, especially in the context of augmenting gaming and virtual reality experiences, but also in the context of food interaction design enabling the creation of new eating experiences. In this paper, we first review prior works on gustatory interfaces and particularly discuss them based on the use of either a chemical, electrical and/or thermal stimulation approach. We then present two concepts for gustatory interfaces that represent a more traditional delivery approach (using a mouthpiece) versus a novel approach that is based on principles of acoustic levitation (contact-less delivery). We discuss the design opportunities around those two concepts in particular to overcome challenges of "how" to stimulate the sense of taste.
... Today's online purchasing decisions are highly influenced by the emotional and personal, and can be mixed with lapses of irrationality. Thus, sometimes, we opt for a product for no reason at all, since we do not make all decisions rationally, especially when making purchasing decisions [52][53][54][55][56][57][58]. Purchasing decisions are wrapped in subjectivity, which makes it difficult to build models to predict consumer behavior, since when irrationality interrupts, there is no model that will work. ...
... According to authors such as Refs. [53,54,59], the perception of value in the purchase intention in the online consumer is that the subject gives the object a meaning, and thus when making a purchase, it generates satisfaction or momentary pleasure; it is also seen by others as a phenomenon that shows a feeling of weak self-esteem: it is more important the action derived from the purchase than the actual possession of the goods [55]. ...
The objective of the research was to validate an instrument designed to measure the variables value perception, purchase intention, trust, and satisfaction of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) dedicated to selling clothing. The PERVAINCONSA Scale (acrostic formed with the initial letters of the Spanish words “Percepción de Valor”, “Intención de Compra”, “Confianza” and “Satisfacción”) was constructed. A total of 238 questionnaires were collected from users of online clothing stores in Peru, Mexico, and Colombia (38.7% men and 61.3% women) with an average age of 24.29 years (SD = 8.04). The KMO and Barlett’s test was 0.958. Confirmatory factor analysis provided an excellent model (χ2 = 372.76, gl = 164; χ2/df = 2.27; CFI = 0.956; RMSEA = 0.073, SRMR = 0.035; and Pclose = 0.00). The model showed good scale reliability given that the composite reliability index (CFI), and all values exceeded the minimum threshold of 0.6. The results suggest that this first version of the PERVAINCONSA presents adequate psychometric evidence to measure value perception, purchase intention, trust and satisfaction in consumers of online stores in Peru, Mexico and Colombia. Thus, it seeks to contribute to the advancement of the scientific study of these important variables in the study of consumer behavior in Latin America.
... Some of them include the stimulation of the sense of taste: LoLLio (Murer et al., 2013) is a small handheld device in a lollipop shape; EdiPulse, is a device that prints a message made of chocolate based on the user's heart rate (Khot et al., 2015); Bean-Counter (Maynes-Aminzade, 2005) maps different types of data with different colours of jelly beans. Other examples move beyond the sense of taste, such as Meta Cookies (Narumi et al., 2010) or Virtual Lemonade (Ranasinghe et al., 2017) that integrate the sense of taste, vision, and smell. Another example is a magnetic dining table and magnetic foods that manipulate the weight of cutlery and foods using magnetic fields (Abd Rahman et al., 2016a;2016b;2016c). ...
... Another example is the LOLLio (Murer et al., 2013), a small spherical device that integrate the actual taste of a candy and the sour taste that is pumped from the grip to the outlet of the candy. Other gustatory interfaces deliver a multisensory stimulation of taste, such as the Meta Cookies (Narumi et al., 2010), which simulates the taste of a plain cookie by dispensing its scent into the user's nose; or the Virtual Lemonade (Ranasinghe et al., 2017), which induces sour taste through electrical stimulation and the colour projected on to the drink. Vi et al. (2018) introduces TasteBud, a plug-and-play device that can deliver individual tastes to users with a standardised protocol. ...
Eating is one of the most multisensory experiences in everyday life. All of our five senses (i.e. taste, smell, vision, hearing and touch) are involved, even if we are not aware of it. However, while multisensory integration has been well studied in psychology, there is not a single platform for testing systematically the effects of different stimuli. This lack of platform results in unresolved design challenges for the design of taste-based immersive experiences. Here, we present LeviSense: the first system designed for multisensory integration in gustatory experiences based on levitated food. Our system enables the systematic exploration of different sensory effects on eating experiences. It also opens up new opportunities for other professionals (e.g., molecular gastronomy chefs) looking for innovative taste-delivery platforms. We describe the design process behind LeviSense and conduct two experiments to test a subset of the crossmodal combinations (i.e., taste and vision, taste and smell). Our results show how different lighting and smell conditions affect the perceived taste intensity, pleasantness, and satisfaction. We discuss how LeviSense creates a new technical, creative, and expressive possibilities in a series of emerging design spaces within Human-Food Interaction.
... Virtual Lemonade is a multimodal AR gustation system used to transmit flavor (color and pH value in this case) from a real beverage to a simulated beverage in another location. The system contains three stages: capturing the color and pH value of the original beverage, transmitting the captured information, and simulating the beverage in a different location (using water, LEDs and controlled electronic pulses to augment real-world sourness sensations) [65]. ...
... There is also a lack of studies of food with different viscosities, elasticities, adhesiveness, pH values, temperature, mixture of solids and liquids at the same time (e.g. eating and drinking consecutively or eating a soup with pieces of solid food inside) [65]. ...
Technology is always evolving; new discoveries have been more specific and deeper levels of interaction between the real and the virtual worlds have been reached. Nowadays, people are increasingly interested in this immersion of sensations and feelings that technology can provide. Besides being fundamental to life, the act of eating brings people together, causing various interactions between them. Eating brings unique sensations that involve different emotions and feelings in people, which can be leveraged to create greater experiences with the use of human-computer interactions. Technology has brought the virtual world closer to the real world in order to enhance culinary experiences, either by creating digital foods or enhancing real ones, by developing devices and programs that are capable of invoking or measuring sensations, with immersion tests where a participant is inserted into a controlled virtual environment closely resembling the real environment, and by measuring and evaluating emotions/responses. This review presents the relationships between humans, computers and food, called human-food interactions, focusing on the use of computational technologies, exploration of human senses, and digital interactions in food experience design, showing the future challenges that need to be overcome.
... The virtual lemonade cup and Vocktail [42,43] uses light and electrical stimulation to augment a glass filled with plain water in order to simulate the appearance and taste sensation of a variety of drinks from lemonade to alcoholic cocktails. EducaTableware [23] and the sensing fork [22] which use a variety of sensors embedded in a fork to detect eating actions such as lifting the fork to the mouth and biting and augment them with sounds or actions in a computer game as a means to encourage small children to eat properly. ...
... The virtual lemonade cup and Vocktail [42,43] mentioned above can be seen as examples of mixed materiality gastroludic toys as they allow exploring the taste properties of various drinks while in effect drinking plain water. ...
Playing with food is both a common taboo and a secret desire. From a young age children are taught not to play with their food but are fed in playful ways ("here comes the aeroplane"). The food we consume be it a fruit picked from a tree or an elaborate restaurant dish is full of play opportunities and recent technological advances such as miniaturized electronics and fabrication techniques have opened up a host of new potentials for play and interaction. In this paper we examine the relationship between food and play, what it means to play with your food? What are the materialities of taste and flavour in a world in which the physical and the digital are deeply intertwined and in which the senses can easily be fooled by virtual means? And what modalities of play are possible with food, drink and flavor sensations?
... By contrast, we are all familiar with how food doesn't seem to taste of anything much whenever we have a cold that blocks our nose (see also O'Hare, 2005 ). It is important to bear such figures in mind when thinking about recent augmentation devices that some have been tempted to claim can transmit lemonade over the internet (see Lant and Norman, 2017;Ranasinghe et al., 2017 ). Note that while this is an ingenious idea, 14 transmitting both a sour sensation electrically (via two electric strips on the rim of the tumbler), together with the appropriate colour (green, yellow, or cloudy in this case) via an LED embedded in the tumbler in which the drink is served (see Fig. 3 ), no attempt was made to simulate, or actually deliver, the aroma of lemon. ...
... In the future, will we able to send others some virtual lemonade? Still image from Ranasinghe et al. (2017) . Reprinted with permission. ...
... Their results revealed that crossmodally matched media enhances the quality of experience compared to a video-only condition. Ranasinghe et al. created a virtual lemonade to digitally change the perception of flavour of a glass of lemonade [164]. This involved using an RGB light emitting diode to change the colour, and a pH sensor to measure how "sour" a plain glass of water was. ...
As technology develops to allow for the integration of additional senses into interactive experiences, there is a need to bridge the divide between the real and the virtual in a manner that stimulates the five senses consistently and in harmony with the sensory expectations of the user. Applying the philosophy of a neurological condition known as synaesthesia and crossmodal correspondences, defined as the coupling of the senses, can provide numerous cognitive benefits and offers an insight into which senses are most likely to be ‘bound’ together.
This thesis aims to present a design paradigm called ‘virtual synaesthesia’ the goal of the paradigm is to make multisensory experiences more human-orientated by considering how the brain combines senses in both the general population (crossmodal correspondences) and within a select few individuals (natural synaesthesia). Towards this aim, a literature review is conducted covering the related areas of research umbrellaed by the concept of ‘virtual synaesthesia’. Its research areas are natural synaesthesia, crossmodal correspondences, multisensory experiences, and sensory substitution/augmentation. This thesis examines augmenting interactive and multisensory experiences with strong (natural synaesthesia) and weak (crossmodal correspondences) synaesthesia. This thesis answers the following research questions: Is it possible to replicate the underlying cognitive benefits of odour-vision synaesthesia? Do people have consistent correspondences between olfaction and an aggregate of different sensory modalities? What is the nature and origin of these correspondences? And Is it possible to predict the crossmodal correspondences attributed to odours? The benefits of augmenting a human-machine interface using an artificial form of odour-vision synaesthesia are explored to answer these questions. This concept is exemplified by transforming odours transduced using a custom-made electronic nose and transforming an odour's ‘chemical footprint’ into a 2D abstract shape representing the current odour. Electronic noses can transform odours in the vapour phase generating a series of electrical signals that represent the current odour source. Weak synaesthesia (crossmodal correspondences) is then investigated to determine if people have consistent correspondences between odours and the angularity of shapes, the smoothness of texture, perceived pleasantness, pitch, musical, and emotional dimensions. Following on from this research, the nature and origin of these correspondences were explored using the underlying hedonic (values relating to pleasantness), semantic (knowledge of the identity of the odour) and physicochemical (the physical and chemical characteristics of the odour) dependencies. The final research chapter investigates the possibility of removing the bottleneck of conducting extensive human trials by determining what the crossmodal correspondences towards specific odours are by developing machine learning models to predict the crossmodal perception of odours using their underlying physicochemical features.
The work presented in this thesis provides some insight and evidence of the benefits of incorporating the concept ‘virtual synaesthesia’ into human-machine interfaces and research into the methodology embodied by ‘virtual synaesthesia’, namely crossmodal correspondences. Overall, the work presented in this thesis shows potential for augmenting multisensory experiences with more refined capabilities leading to more enriched experiences, better designs, and a more intuitive way to convey information crossmodally.
... Future designs may need to take these shortcomings into consideration, to provide novel multisensory digital commensality experiences, for example by allowing co-diners to share smell or taste. HCI research projects have started to explore how to design for smell and taste by creating devices that can evoke specific sensory experiences [70] and allow one to share a flavor experience digitally [63]. Moreover, given that the sense of touch functions as a communication channel in the context of remote commensality, digital tactile devices -such as ultrasound haptic displays [66] or pneumoactuated displays [86] -could further enable co-diners to express their emotions and, as a result, create a physical link and a sense of togetherness [49]. ...
With one-person households being increasingly common and Covid-19 lockdown policies forcing people to stay home, remote dining has become common practice for many, who take it as an opportunity to connect with others in times of loneliness. Sharing meals online, also known as digital commensality, is a rich form of interaction, where people leverage technology to achieve a sense of connectedness and belonging while eating. In this paper, we look at digital commensality and we explore its inherent playful potential with the aim to inspire the design of engaging technologies that can support, enhance and augment this form of interaction. For this, we used a situated play design approach to document and analyze the behavior of 36 people (including pairs of friends and strangers) sharing meals online. Our analysis surfaced a set of play potentials of remote dining -- i.e., playful things people already do and enjoy spontaneously while sharing meals online. We present those play potentials as inspirational material: they can motivate and enrich the design of future digital commensality technologies by responding to people's desire for playful and social interaction with, through, and around food.
... For example, in [262], authors combined electrical stimulation of tongue and smell modules that disperse aromas to simulate the multi-sensory flavor experience of drinking a cocktail beverage. Similar approaches have been proposed to simulate the flavor experience of various beverages like coffee [261] and lemonade [260]. ...
Food is a vital component of our everyday lives closely related to our health, well-being, and human behavior. The recent advancements of Spatial Computing technologies, particularly in Human-Food interactive (HFI) technologies have enabled novel eating and drinking experiences, including digital dietary assessments, augmented flavors, and virtual and augmented dining experiences. When designing novel HFI technologies, it is essential to recognize different food and beverages and their internal attributes (i.e., food sensing), such as volume and ingredients. As a result, contemporary research employs image analysis techniques to identify food items, notably in digital dietary assessments. These techniques, often combined with AI algorithms, analyze digital food images to extract various information about food items and quantities. However, these visual food analyzing methods are ineffective when: 1) identifying food’s internal attributes, 2) discriminating visually similar food and beverages, and 3) seamlessly integrating with people’s natural interactions while consuming food (e.g., automatically detecting the food when using a spoon to eat). This thesis presents a novel approach to digitally recognize beverages and their attributes, an essential step towards facilitating novel human-food interactions. The proposed technology has an electrical impedance measurement unit and a recognition method based on deep learning techniques. The electrical impedance measurement unit consists of the following components: 1) a 3D printed module with electrodes that can be attached to a paper cup, 2) an impedance analyzer to perform Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) across two electrodes to acquire measurements such as a beverage’s real part of impedances, imaginary part of impedances, phase angles, and 3) a control module to configure the impedance analyzer and send measurements to a computer that has the deep learning framework to conduct the analysis. Two types of multi-task learning models (hard parameter sharing multi-task network and multi-task network cascade) and their variations (with principal component analysis and different combinations of features) were employed to develop a proof-of-concept prototype to recognize eight different beverage types with various volume levels and sugar concentrations: two types of black tea (LiptonTM and TwiningsTM English-Breakfast), two types of coffee (StarbucksTM dark roasted and medium roasted), and four types of soda (regular and diet coca-cola, and regular and diet Pepsi). Measurements were acquired from these beverages while changing volume levels and sugar concentrations to construct training and test datasets. Both types of networks were trained using the training dataset while validated with the test dataset. Results show that the multi-task network cascades outperformed the hard parameter sharing multi-task networks in discriminating against a limited number of drinks (accuracy = 96.32%), volumes (root mean square error = 13.74ml), and sugar content (root mean square error = 7.99gdm3). Future work will extend this approach to include additional beverage types and their attributes to improve the robustness and performance of the system and develop a methodology to recognize solid foods with their attributes. The findings of this thesis will contribute to enable a new avenue for human-food interactive technology developments, such as automatic food journaling, virtual flavors, and wearable devices for non-invasive quality assessment.
... Por exemplo, uma limonada virtual (Virtual Lemonade) pode ser "degustada" pelo consumidor, pois o dispositivo é capaz de captar a cor e o valor do pH de uma limonada (entre outros líquidos), sendo que esses dados podem ser transmitidos digitalmente para um copo especial cheio de água pura em outro local. Ao receber as informações, o copo muda a cor do líquido por meio de LEDs e produz estímulos elétricos na língua do usuário(Ranasinghe et al., 2017).Vídeo "Smell, taste, Touch Via the Internet -Hi-Tech": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxFXjKn1LxQ ...
Este livro de acesso livre introduz estudantes, docentes, investigadores e profissionais de marketing e gestão aos fundamentos científicos do marketing sensorial e à sua aplicação a vários setores de atividade. São apresentados casos no retalho, hospitalidade e turismo.
Agapito, D. (2022). Marketing Sensorial: Casos no retalho, hospitalidade e turismo. Faro: Sílabas & Desafios. DOI: 10.37548/MSEN.2022
... We also modified the general design of TransFork. According to the acidity current range of 60μA to 180μA [11], and remove 160μA which was insignificant to be divided into four currents. Fig. 2 illustrates the circuit diagram of TransFork + . ...
... For the simulation of other sensory characteristics of food, such as taste and texture, VR might not be the appropriate tool to use. Other technologies, such as augmenting flavor with electric sensors, can be used to simulate the taste of the food (Ranasinghe, Jain, Karwita, & Do, 2017). It would be interesting for future studies to explore the potential of combining VR and those technologies and applying them to sensory evaluation research. ...
Background
The development of virtual reality (VR) technology has the potential to provide enormous opportunities for food and consumer behavior research to further explore current research methodologies and establish new ones. VR is different from the environment we experience in daily life. Therefore, the extent to which VR can be applied in food consumer behavior research needs to be assessed on the basis of the evidence provided by the studies that have employed VR.
Approach
To better understand VR technology and its potential applications and limitations in food and consumer behavior research, we conducted a systematic review of the literature on VR in food and consumer behavior research. The applications of VR addressed in the articles were extracted. The validity of VR for food and consumer behavior research was analyzed.
Key findings
VR has been used to build complex and realistic contextual environments for conducting food sensory evaluation research. VR was also used as a substitute (e.g., a VR buffet and supermarket) to real life settings for investigating consumers' purchasing behavior and food choices. Virtual food and food-related cues were used to induce psychological and physiological responses in consumers. The results supported the validity of VR as a tool for investigating consumers’ behavior toward food.
... For instance, Ranasinghe and colleagues created two such beverage delivery systems, the Virtual Lemonade and the Vocktail. The Virtual Lemonade uses colored LED lights to overlay a color on plain water, combined with electrically stimulated sour taste sensations on the user's tongue (Ranasinghe et al., 2017a). The Vocktail goes one step further, by combining colored lights and electrically induced tastes with scent delivery, to digitally alter the flavor of a given drink (Ranasinghe et al., 2017b). ...
It is well known that the appearance of food, particularly its color, can influence flavor perception and identification. However, food studies involving the manipulation of product color face inevitable limitations, from extrinsic flavors introduced by food coloring to the cost in development time and resources in order to produce different product variants. One solution lies in modern virtual reality (VR) technology, which has become increasingly accessible, sophisticated, and widespread over the past years. In the present study, we investigated whether making a coffee look milkier in a VR environment can alter its perceived flavor and liking. Thirty-two United Kingdom (UK) consumers were given four samples of black cold brew coffee at 4 and 8% sucrose concentration. They wore VR headsets throughout the study and viewed the same coffee in a virtual setting. The color of the beverage was manipulated in VR, such that participants saw either a dark brown or light brown liquid as they sipped the coffee. A full factorial design was used so that each participant tasted each sweetness x color combination, Participants reported sweetness, creaminess, and liking for each sample. Results revealed that beverage color as viewed in VR significantly influenced perceived creaminess, with the light brown coffee rated to be creamier than dark brown coffee. However, beverage color did not influence perceived sweetness or liking. The present study supports the role of VR as a means of conducting food perception studies, either to gain a better understanding of multisensory integration, or, from an industry perspective, to enable rapid product testing when it may be time-intensive or costly to produce the same range of products in the real-world. Furthermore, it opens potential future opportunities for VR to promote healthy eating behavior by manipulating the visual appearance of foods.
... The "Affective Tumbler" [68] conveys thermal sensations to the nasal area to stimulate the skin's temperature response during drinking, the change in skin temperature attributed to the beverage can lead users to experience pleasant or unpleasant feelings. Also "Virtual Lemonade" [54] teleports a soft drink by replicating its color and pH value remotely using plain water. While these prior works focus primarily on either supporting the instrumental aspects of beverage-based interactions, or on augmenting taste sensations, we focus on supporting the experiential aspects. ...
Recent advances in interactive technology are being used to enrich our interactions around food and drinks. Making use of sound to enrich dining - providing “gustosonic” experiences - has recently garnered interest as an exciting area of ubiquitous computing. However, these experiences have tended to focus on eating. In response to the lack of drinking-focused experiences, we explore the combining playful design and drinking activities so as to allow users to experience playful personalized sounds via drinking through "Sonic Straws". We present the findings of an in-the-wild study that highlights how our system supported self-expression via playful drinking actions, facilitated pleasurable social drinking moments, and promoted reflection on drinking practices. We discuss the implications of this work for designers of future gustosonic experiences, including how to amplify entertainment experiences around drinking/eating, how to highlight the joy coming from multisensory experiences, and how to facilitate mindful engagement with what one drinks. Ultimately, we aim to contribute to the enrichment of dining experiences through playful design.
... This makes the system impractical in real user scenarios. Another study has transferred the partial flavor of lemonade to be tasted [24]. The tested system only transferred the color and the amount of sourness of the drink, but not the other dimensions of the flavor or scent of the drink. ...
... "Affective Tumbler" uses the same cross-modal principles and applies thermal sensations on the skin to stimulate skin temperature changes [195]. In [208], the authors highlight through "TasteBud" how the complete spectrum of five basic tastes can be employed and propose a novel and innovative delivery mechanism that uses acoustic levitation-"TastyFloats." "Virtual Lemonade" introduces a new method and a digital platform for sharing lemonade using cross-modal principles that consists of sensing (RGB color and pH value are captured), distribution (the XML protocol to encode the data), and stimulation through a tumbler that overlays color over the beverage and stimulates the tongue using electric impulses [161]. ...
Mulsemedia—multiple sensorial media—makes possible the inclusion of layered sensory stimulation and interaction through multiple sensory channels. The recent upsurge in technology and wearables provides mulsemedia researchers a vehicle for potentially boundless choice. However, in order to build systems that integrate various senses, there are still some issues that need to be addressed. This review deals with mulsemedia topics that remain insufficiently explored by previous work, with a focus on the multi-multi (multiple media-multiple senses) perspective, where multiple types of media engage multiple senses. Moreover, it addresses the evolution of previously identified challenges in this area and formulates new exploration directions.
... Finally, while the design of future taste-based technologies is increasingly fascinating engineers, computer scientists, and designers of novel user interfaces, we still lack a comprehensive understanding on how such new technologies are going to affect users' performance and human behaviour. We believe that our findings can inspire and steer the design of novel gustatory interfaces [43][44][45][46] . This work provides a first but essential step towards decoding the effect of taste on human decision-making under risk. ...
Taking risks is part of everyday life. Some people actively pursue risky activities (e.g., jumping out of a plane), while others avoid any risk (e.g., people with anxiety disorders). Paradoxically, risk-taking is a primitive behaviour that may lead to a happier life by offering a sense of excitement through self-actualization. Here, we demonstrate for the first time that sour - amongst the five basic tastes (sweet, bitter, sour, salty, and umami) - promotes risk-taking. Based on a series of three experiments, we show that sour has the potential to modulate risk-taking behaviour across two countries (UK and Vietnam), across individual differences in risk-taking personality and styles of thinking (analytic versus intuitive). Modulating risk-taking can improve everyday life for a wide range of people.
... In user studies with these systems, participants again reported perceiving sour, bitter and salty taste sensations at varying intensities. Similarly, both FunRasa and work on creating virtual lemonade (Ranasinghe, Jain, Karwita, & Do, 2017) present interactive platforms that aim to enhance drinking experiences by combining techniques for superimposing colours onto beverages and stimulating the user's taste buds via electrical pulses controlled by a Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) based technique. Here, preliminary results from both studies suggest that participants were able to perceive altered sensations of sourness, saltiness, and bitterness when using these systems. ...
In recent years there has been a growing interest in the potential benefits and new applications that may be afforded by incorporating digital flavour augmentation technologies into traditional eating and drinking experiences. Although many studies have shown how controlled olfactory, visual and auditory cues can impact flavour experiences, there has been a relatively small amount of work that has investigated the utilisation of digital gustatory (taste) augmentation in the same context. Hence, we have created two utensils, a pair of chopsticks and a soup bowl, that apply controlled electrical pulses to the tip of the tongue during consumption in order to augment flavours through electrical stimulation. As such, in this paper we present a study that aimed to evaluate the impact of electric taste augmentation on two types of eating experiences: consuming mashed potato and miso soup. Based on this study, our findings demonstrate that 1) significant increases in perceived saltiness and sourness can be achieved when consuming unsalted mashed potato and 2) significantly higher ratings of sourness can be achieved when consuming diluted miso soup.
... As far as the modulation of beverage perception by the device is concerned, it is worth noting that the majority of previous works failed to create the sensation of tasting "virtual beverages" (via the internet) by means of electrical and thermal stimulation (Lant and Norman, 2017;Ranasinghe et al., 2017). One of the reasons for these failures might be due to the lack of a simultaneous chemical stimulation by means odors (using olfactory devices). ...
Studies of olfactory perception and about the way humans interact with, and perceive food and beverages require appropriate olfactory devices. Moreover, small size, and portable interfaces are needed within the context of Human Computer Interaction (HCI), to enrich and complete the design of different mediated experiences. In this paper, the authors tested a new portable olfactory device for the orthonasal administration of smells. The aim was at verifying if the experience generated by the odors delivered through such device can affect people’s perception of taste. Once established that people could perceive odors using the olfactory device, a group of participants was asked to taste two different types of food (Experiment 1) and three types of beverages (Experiment 2) and to evaluate them on a number of perceptual-dimensions (such as pleasantness, freshness, sweetness, saltiness and bitterness). The participants could taste the food and the beverage without the presence of additional olfactory stimuli or under conditions where olfactory stimuli (smell of chocolate or citrus) were also presented by means of the device. The results showed that the participants’ evaluation of food and beverages were significantly modulated by the concurrently presented odors. The experimental results suggest that: 1) the device is effective in controlling the delivery of odours to human participants without the complexity of management that often affect larger odours delivery systems; 2) odors administered by means of such device can have an effects on food and beverage perception, without the need to change their chemical properties.
... Borrowing the metaphor of the multi-color ballpoint pen color switching operation, one can push a button to switch taste with corresponding color (ocean blue salty or lime green sour) [54]. Our recent Virtual Lemonade system [55] further explores the opportunity of sensing and teleporting the color and corresponding PH value of a glass of lemonade to a customized tumbler to virtually simulate these properties with plain water. Figure 10 shows the Taste+ spoon design with electrodes, and push button to switch between the different tastes with corresponding LED light colors (left), a study participant stating the spoon is quite sour (middle), and the Virtual Lemonade system with three main components: (1) the lemonade sensor, (2) the communication protocol, and (3) a customized tumbler, acting as the lemonade simulator (right). ...
In this preface I argue that the Design for Assistive Augmentation should take 3M’s into consideration: Mind, to observe before acting, to be thoughtful, and open-minded; Might, to consider the capacity, and competency of people and the technology; and, Magic, to have technology wonderfully blended in everyday life activities. I discuss the idea of building computational tools as a way of working, the idea of Creating Unique Technology for Everyone, and the asipiration to create new types of physical and computational dumbbells to help people to build muscles, running shoes to help people run faster, and skis to enable people to have new kind of experience enabled by the tools and to augment human capabilities.
... Whilst some of the topics we called submissions for were not directly represented (e.g., food experiences in virtual reality, the future of sensory marketing) in our workshop, they are nevertheless in the broader literature. For example, Ranasinghe and colleagues [4] recently developed their "virtual lemonade", a system that combines a pH sensor, LED lights, and electric impulses on the tongue to allow users to share a virtual drink over the internet. On the other hand, there are currently multiple research initiatives to further the topic such as the call for papers in the Journal of Food Research International on "Virtual reality and food: Applications in sensory and consumer science" ...
We present an introduction paper to the second version of the workshop on ‘Multisensory Approaches to Human-Food Interaction’ to be held at the 19th ACM International Conference on Multimodal Interaction, which will take place on November 13th, 2017, in Glasgow, Scotland. Here, we describe the workshop’s objectives, the key contributions of the different position papers, and the relevance of their respective topic(s). Both multisensory research and new technologies are evolving fast which has opened up a number of possibilities for designing new ways of interacting with foods and drinks. This workshop highlights the rapidly growing interest in the field of Multisensory Human-Food Interaction, which can, for example, be observed in the variety of novel research and technology developments in the area.
... To simulate di erent taste stimuli in the Vocktail system, we have incorporated the electric taste technology as explained in [16,19]. A constant-current source is implemented to output controlled electrical pulses, which ensures that the electrical stimuli are not altered depending on the resistance of the user's tongue [7,20]. ...
Similar to the concept of a cocktail or mocktail, we present Vocktail (a.k.a. Virtual Cocktail) - an interactive drinking utensil that digitally simulates multisensory flavor experiences. The Vocktail system utilizes three common sensory modalities, taste, smell, and visual (color), to create virtual flavors and augment the existing flavors of a beverage. The system is coupled with a mobile application that enables users to create customized virtual flavor sensations by configuring each of the stimuli via Bluetooth. The system consists of a cocktail glass that is seamlessly fused into a 3D printed structure, which holds the electronic control module, three scent cartridges, and three micro air-pumps. When a user drinks from the system, the visual (RGB light projected on the beverage), taste (electrical stimulation at the tip of the tongue), and smell stimuli (emitted by micro air-pumps) are combined to create a virtual flavor sensation, thus altering the flavor of the beverage. In summary, this paper discusses 1) technical details of the Vocktail system and 2) user experiments that investigate the influences of these multimodal stimuli on the perception of virtual flavors in terms of five primary tastes (i.e. salty, sweet, bitter, sour, and umami). Our results suggest that the combination of these stimuli delivers richer flavor experiences, as compared to separately simulating individual modalities, and indicates that the types of pairings that can be formed between smell and electric taste stimuli.
... By contrast, we are all familiar with how food doesn"t seem to taste of anything much whenever we have a cold that blocks our nose (see also O' Hare, 2005). It is important to bear such figures in mind when thinking about recent augmentation devices that some have been tempted to claim can transmit lemonade over the internet (see Lant & Norman, 2017;Ranasinghe, Jain, Karwita, & Do, 2017). Note that while this is an ingenious solution, 14 transmitting both a sour sensation electrically (via two electric strips on the rim of the tumbler), together with the appropriate colour (green, yellow, or cloudy in this case) via an LED embedded in the tumbler in which the drink is served (see Figure 3), no attempt was made to simulate, or actually deliver, the aroma of lemon. ...
Many people are understandably excited by the suggestion that the chemical senses can be digitized; be it to deliver ambient fragrances (e.g., in virtual reality or health-related applications), or else to transmit flavour experiences via the internet. However, to date, progress in this area has been surprisingly slow. Furthermore, the majority of the attempts at successful commercialization have failed, often in the face of consumer ambivalence over the perceived benefits/utility. In this review, with the focus squarely on the domain of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), we summarize the state-of-the-art in the area. We highlight the key possibilities and pitfalls as far as stimulating the so-called ‘lower’ senses of taste, smell, and the trigeminal system are concerned. Ultimately, we suggest that mixed reality solutions are currently the most plausible as far as delivering (or rather modulating) flavour experiences digitally is concerned. The key problems with digital fragrance delivery are related to attention and attribution. People often fail to detect fragrances when they are concentrating on something else; And even when they detect that their chemical senses have been stimulated, there is always a danger that they attribute their experience (e.g., pleasure) to one of the other senses – this is what we call ‘the fundamental attribution error’. We conclude with an outlook on digitizing the chemical senses and summarize a set of open-ended questions that the HCI community has to address in future explorations of smell and taste as interaction modalities.
The present study investigates the role of virtual contextual information, including also affective information, in gustatory perception of crisps (fried potato chips). In a first preliminary experiment we evaluated the association among three Augmented Reality animations (a pear-like character jumping a rope, a black-and-white cartoon character, a Venus flytrap carnivorous plant) and a different series of feelings and emotional states (i.e., cheerfulness, sadness, anger, aggressiveness, fear, anxiety, disgust, surprise, shame, tiredness, boredom). In a second experiment the participants evaluated the gustatory perception of three different kinds of chips on several dimensions (e.g., pleasantness, crispiness, healthiness, purchase intention) by using visual analogue scales. The chips were presented within an Augmented Reality environment where the animations evaluated in Experiment 1 were placed close to the serving plate. The results of our study demonstrated that the chips tasted with the pear-like character animation (categorized as cheerful in Experiment 1) were judged as healthier than those tasted with black-and-white (i.e., sad) and Venus flytrap character animations, (i.e., aggressive). Moreover, people's purchase intentions were higher with the pear-like character animation, as compared to the black-and-white character animation. These results showed that the context created by AR can affect participants ‘food perception across several dimensions.
Embedded in everyday practices, food can be a rich resource for interaction design. This article focuses on eating experiences to uncover how bodily, sensory, and socio-cultural aspects of eating can be better leveraged for the design of user experience. We report a systematic literature review of 109 papers, and interviews with 18 professional chefs, providing new understandings of prior HFI research, as well as how professional chefs creatively design eating experiences. The findings inform a conceptual framework of designing for user experience leveraging eating experiences. These findings also inform implications for HFI design suggesting the value of multisensory flavor experiences, external and internal sensory stimulation and deprivation, aspects of eating for communicating meaning, and designing with contrasting pleasurable and uncomfortable experiences. The article concludes with six charts as novel generative design tools for HFI experiences focused on sensory, emotional, communicative, performative, and temporal experiences.
Addressing consumer needs is key to success in new product development. Due to COVID-19, however, gathering feedback on food products has become challenging. Our preliminary research on the food industry revealed that the socially distanced lifestyle has deprived food practitioners of in-person testing platforms, inspiring our research questions. Although a myriad of virtual methods for food testing have been reported in the past two decades, the literature does not provide systematic assessment of their applicability. Therefore, in this review of 108 papers, we delineate the landscape of virtual technologies for food testing and present their practical implications. From our analysis, VR emerged as a promising tool, yet it was not being used by practitioners. Other technologies (e.g. flavor simulators) were too preliminary to be adopted in industry. Furthermore, the types of technologies were fragmented, leaving much room for cross-tech integration. Future research goals to address the gaps are discussed.
This chapter is the sketch of a possible pattern of the future world in which any kind of business will be developed in a completely new human, technological, agricultural, and commercial context, heavily and quickly changed from the one we live in now. The first objective of this chapter is to scout for the mega-technology trends that will reshape completely the future business and jobs, focusing on the agrifood industry. The second objective is to tackle the main challenges to patent inventions in terms of costs and timing in Romania, relative to other countries, and raise pragmatic recommendations. The third objective is to describe the institutional innovation called INACO (the Initiative for Competitiveness), a think-tank dedicated to tackle the challenges and opportunities of the future economy and how can a country such as Romania stay competitive in a more and more competitive world.
Background music adds a multisensory element to marketing and e‐commerce. Applying interactive sensory‐enabling technologies (SETs) to online shopping websites is an area of interest in sensory marketing. This research examines interactive background music in e‐commerce and investigates how online consumer involvement moderates the effects of interactive music. Single‐factor experiments with three conditions (interactive music, static background music, and control) were conducted to investigate its impact on experiential value, cognitive value, and purchase intention of high‐ and low‐involvement consumers among both students (Study 1, N = 251) and nonstudent samples (Study 2, N = 218). Different music genres were applied to stimuli of the two studies to demonstrate the generalizability of the findings. Results find that interactive music enhances the experiential value of e‐commerce for low‐involvement consumers. By contrast, high‐involvement consumers show greater purchase intention under the interactive music condition due to a heightened level of perceived cognitive value. Involvement is an effective predictor of elaboration and purchase intention under the interactive music condition, but not under the other two conditions. The contribution is twofold: (a) it shows the impact of music as an interactive SET and, (b) demonstrates the moderating role of consumer involvement in the context of multisensory integration in e‐commerce. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed along with limitations and directions for future research.
Human augmentation is a field of research that aims to enhance human abilities through medicine or technology. This has historically been achieved by consuming chemical substances that improve a selected ability or by installing implants which require medical operations. Both of these methods of augmentation can be invasive. Augmented abilities have also been achieved with external tools, such as eyeglasses, binoculars, microscopes or highly sensitive microphones. Lately, augmented reality and multimodal interaction technologies have enabled non-invasive ways to augment human. In this article, we first discuss the field and related terms. We provide relevant definitions based on the present understanding of the field. This is followed by a summary of existing work in augmented senses, action, and cognition. Our contribution to the future includes a model for wearable augmentation. In addition, we present a call for research to realize this vision. Then, we discuss future human abilities. Wearable technologies may act as mediators for human augmentation, in the same manner as eyeglasses once revolutionized human vision. Non-invasive and easy-to-use wearable extensions will enable lengthening the active life for aging citizens or supporting the full inclusion of people with special needs in society, but there are also potential problems. Therefore, we conclude by discussing ethical and societal issues: privacy, social manipulation, autonomy and side effects, accessibility, safety and balance, and unpredictable future.
People are increasingly purchasing (e.g., food, clothes) and consuming (e.g., movies, courses) online where, traditionally, the sensory interaction has mostly been limited to visual, and to a lesser extent auditory, inputs. However, other sensory interfaces (e.g., including touch screens, together with a range of virtual, and augmented solutions) are increasingly being made available to people to interact online. Moreover, recent progress in the field of human-computer interaction means that online environments will likely engage more of the senses and become more connected with offline environments in the coming years. This expansion will likely coincide with an increasing engagement with the consumer's more emotional senses, namely touch/haptics, and possibly even olfaction. Forward-thinking marketers and researchers will therefore need to appropriate the latest tools/technologies in order to deliver richer online experiences for tomorrow's consumers. This review is designed to help the interested reader better understand what sensory marketing in a digital context can offer, thus hopefully opening the way for further research and development in the area.
This paper presents a new technology that overlays virtual taste sensations on food and beverages while eating and drinking. This additional layer of taste sensation enables modifying the existing taste sensations (flavors) of food and beverages virtually. To achieve this technology, we primarily use weak and controlled electrical pulses on the tip of the tongue (while eating and drinking). The ability of this technology to simulate primary taste sensations such as salty, sour, and bitter has made us able to merge it into everyday eating and drinking utensils such as the spoon and beverage bottle, thus to augment the taste sensations of food and beverages. In addition to electrical pulses, we change the color of the beverage using an RGB Light Emitting Diode (LED). Two prototype systems produced with this technology, Spoon+ and Bottle+ are explained in this paper. First, we present a comprehensive technical description of these utensils. Then, we detailed a user experiment conducted to study the effectiveness of our approach. Through these two prototype systems, we discuss the impact of this technology to create immersive taste experiences when consuming food and beverages. With focus on new features and improvements of several limitations of the existing systems, we present our future vision that enables merging of this technology into more appliances thus making a platform for creating virtual food and beverage ingredients.
Can basic tastes, such as sweet, sour, bitter, salty, and possibly also umami, be conveyed by means of colour? If so, how should we understand the relationship between colours and tastes: Is it universal or relative, innate or acquired, unidirectional or bidirectional? Here, we review the growing body of scientific research showing that people systematically associate specific colours with particular tastes. We highlight how these widely shared bidirectional crossmodal correspondences generalize across cultures and stress their difference from synaesthesia (with which they are often confused). The various explanations that have been put forward to account for such crossmodal mappings are then critically evaluated. Finally, we go on to look at some of the innovative ways in which chefs, culinary artists, designers, and marketers are taking—or could potentially push further—the latest insights from research in this area as inspiration for their own creative endeavours.
We report a cross-cultural study designed to investigate crossmodal correspondences between a variety of visual features (11 colors, 15 shapes, and 2 textures) and the five basic taste terms (bitter, salty, sour, sweet, and umami). A total of 452 participants from China, India, Malaysia, and the USA viewed color patches, shapes, and textures online and had to choose the taste term that best matched the image and then rate their confidence in their choice. Across the four groups of participants, the results revealed a number of crossmodal correspondences between certain colors/shapes and bitter, sour, and sweet tastes. Crossmodal correspondences were also documented between the color white and smooth/rough textures on the one hand and the salt taste on the other. Cross-cultural differences were observed in the correspondences between certain colors, shapes, and one of the textures and the taste terms. The taste-patterns shown by the participants from the four countries tested in the present study are quite different from one another, and these differences cannot easily be attributed merely to whether a country is Eastern or Western. These findings therefore highlight the impact of cultural background on crossmodal correspondences. As such, they raise a number of interesting questions regarding the neural mechanisms underlying crossmodal correspondences.
In two studies, we found that sharing an experience with another person, without communicating, amplifies one's experience. Both pleasant and unpleasant experiences were more intense when shared. In Study 1, participants tasted pleasant chocolate. They judged the chocolate to be more likeable and flavorful when they tasted it at the same time that another person did than when that other person was present but engaged in a different activity. Although these results were consistent with our hypothesis that shared experiences are amplified compared with unshared experiences, it could also be the case that shared experiences are more enjoyable in general. We designed Study 2 to distinguish between these two explanations. In this study, participants tasted unpleasantly bitter chocolate and judged it to be less likeable when they tasted it simultaneously with another person than when that other person was present but doing something else. These results support the amplification hypothesis.
Four experiments were conducted to assess the effect of food color on flavor identification of noncarbonated beverages and to assess the interactive effect of food color and flavor levels on the perceived flavor intensity and hedonic quality of beverages and cake. Results showed that color masking dramatically decreased flavor identification of fruit-flavored beverages, while atypical colors induced incorrect flavor responses that were characteristically associated with the atypical color. In addition, the color level of beverages had significant effects on their overall acceptability, acceptability of color and of flavor, as well as on flavor intensity. The same results were shown with cake samples, with the exception that a significant interaction of color and flavor level was observed on overall acceptability. Correlational analysis on the subjective dimensions showed that the overall acceptability of both the beverage and cake products was more closely associated with ratings of flavor acceptability than with ratings of color acceptability. In addition, a test of the effect of colorant safety information showed that such information did not decrease any aspect of a product's acceptability.
This book deals with biomimetic sensors that can quantify taste and smell - the electronic tongue and nose. Of all sensor technologies, these have been widely considered as the most difficult to realise and the development of these sensors significantly contributes to the understanding of the reception mechanisms in gustatory and olfactory systems. The author begins by dealing with the basic principles of measurement and multivariate analysis. Reception mechanisms in biological systems are briefly reviewed. Several types of biosensor, including enzyme-immobilized membranes, SPR, the quartz resonance oscillator and IC technologies are explained in detail. This book is the first to focus on artificial taste and smell sensors and also reviews conventional biosensors, such as enzyme sensors, in detail.
The main objective of this study is to create a method that can affect flavor perception, without changing the food itself, by applying thermal sensations to the skin around the nose to simulate skin temperature changes associated with pleasant and unpleasant feelings. Recent physiological research has demonstrated that skin temperature changes affect flavor perception. Based on the James-Lange theory, which claims that changes in bodily responses unconsciously evoke emotions and change our perception related to an emotional state, we hypothesized that flavor perception can be modified by affecting the skin temperature properly. To test this theory, we developed an "Affecting Tumbler," which presents thermal sensations to the skin around the nose for simulating the skin's temperature response during drinking. Our user study suggested that flavor richness and aftertaste strength were significantly improved by heating up the skin in the nasal region. These results indicate that flavor perception can be controlled with the proposed method.
A growing body of scientific evidence now shows that what people taste when evaluating a wine, and how much they enjoy the experience, can be influenced by the music that happens to be playing at the same time. It has long been known that what we hear can influence the hedonic aspects of tasting. However, what the latest research now shows is that by playing the “right” music one can also impact specific sensory-discriminative aspects of tasting as well. Music has been shown to influence the perceived acidity, sweetness, fruitiness, astringency, and length of wine. We argue against an account of such results in terms of synaesthesia, or “oenesthesia,” as some have chosen to call it. Instead, we suggest that attention, directed via the crossmodal correspondences that exist between sound and taste (in the popular meaning of the term, i.e., flavor), can modify (perhaps enhance, or certainly highlight when attended, or suppress when unattended) certain elements in the complex tasting experience that is drinking wine. We also highlight the likely role played by any change in the mood or emotional state of the person listening to the music on taste/aroma perception as well. Finally, we highlight how the crossmodal masking of sweetness perception may come into effect if the music happens to be too loud (a form of crossmodal sensory masking). Taken together, the evidence reviewed here supports the claim that, strange though it may seem, what we hear (specifically in terms of music) really can change our perception of the taste of wine, not to mention how much we enjoy the experience. Several plausible mechanisms that may underlie such crossmodal effects are outlined.
In this paper, we present a new methodology for integrating the sense of taste with the existing digital communication domain. First, we discuss existing problems and limitations for integrating the sense of taste as a digital communication media. Then, to assess this gap, we present a solution with three core modules: the transmitter, form of communication, and receiver. The transmitter is a mobile application, where the sender formulates a taste message to send. Then, for communication, we present a new extensible markup language (XML) format, the TasteXML (TXML) to specify the format of taste messages. As the receiver (actuator), we introduce Digital Taste Stimulator, a novel method for stimulating taste sensations on human. Initial user experiments and qualitative feedbacks were discussed mainly focusing on the Digital Taste Stimulator. We conclude with a brief overview of future aspects of this technology and possibilities on other application domains.
In this paper, we describe an interactive drinking platform, FunRasa, which digitally expands one's drinking experience. The system uses two methods: electrical stimulation on user's tongue and superimpose virtual color onto the actual drink, to expand the taste sensations of the drink. The system consists of a glass cup, an electronic platform with RGB LEDs, and a specially designed straw interface with two silver electrodes. When a user uses the straw, his tongue touches the silver electrodes (both lower and upper surfaces of the tip of the tongue) and is thus electrically stimulated when drinking. The user has the freedom to change the virtual color of the drink along with the magnitude of the current using two mechanical dials. Furthermore, we present several initial discussions on the user experience through a workshop that we conducted and several future usage scenarios of this technology.
Most of the systems for generating taste sensations are based on blending different chemicals appropriately, and there are less proven approaches to stimulate the sense of taste digitally. In this paper, a method to digitally stimulate the sense of taste is introduced and demonstrated based on electrical and thermal stimulation on human tongue. Thus, two digital control systems are presented to control taste sensations and their intensities effectively on the tongue. The effects of most persuading factors such as current, frequency, and temperature have been accounted to noninvasively stimulate the tongue. The initial experimental results indicate that sour (strong), bitter (mild), and salty(mild) are the main sensations, which can be evoked while there are evidences of sweet sensation too. Based on the results of the Tongue Mounted Digital Taste Interface, we have then developed another system which named as the Digital Sour Lollipop to effectively control the sour taste digitally. Initial experimental results of this system show the controllability of sour taste up to three levels of intensities using the electrical stimulation on human tongue.
A taste sensor with global selectivity, i.e., electronic tongue, is composed of several kinds of lipid/polymer membranes for transforming information of taste substances into electric signal. The sensor output shows different patterns for chemical substances which have different taste qualities such as saltiness and sourness. Taste interactions such as suppression effect, which occurs between bitterness and sweetness, can be detected and quantified using the taste sensor. Amino acids and peptides can be classified into several groups according to their own tastes from sensor outputs. Bitter-tasting amino acids such as l-tryptophan have response electric patterns similar to a typical bitter substance, quinine. The taste of foodstuffs such as beer, sake, coffee, mineral water, milk and vegetables can be discussed quantitatively. The taste sensor with lipid membranes provides the objective scale for the human sensory expression and will contribute to clarification of the reception mechanism at gustatory cells.
Electric taste is a characteristic taste produced when the tongue is electrically stimulated. We have proposed apparatuses to add electric taste to food and drink. An interactive system could be developed to synchronize video contents using the reversibility and instantaneity of electric taste. However, to do so, the presentation time must be determined based on the different latency for the perception of each sense. We measured the latencies for electric taste and visual stimuli as a basic evaluation for a content presentation system in which electric taste and visual content are synchronized.
To use Nature as a model for a new sensor technique - that is a concept that has become very attractive in recent years. This biomimetic approach deals with sensors and sensor systems based on mechanisms found in biological systems. One branch consists of the concept of biosensors, a biosensor being a combination of a biologically active material with a transducer element. Another branch consists of the concept of artificial senses, such as so-called electronic noses and electronic tongues. The principles of these are analogous to the sense of smell: a signal pattern from a sensor array with different selectivities is processed with multivariate data analysis for recognition and learning. Electronic noses have already become an established technique, and the establishment of electronic tongues is rapidly growing.
Professor K Toko at Kyushu University, who is a pioneer in these fields, has now written a book to introduce the biomimetic approach to sensor technology. He has also developed an electronic tongue based on lipid/polymer membranes. The aim of this system is to mimic the human taste sensation; therefore it is called a `taste sensor'. This taste sensing system has now also been commercialized. The book also covers this taste sensing system in detail.
In the introductory part, the principles of measurement systems and different techniques of multivariate data analysis are described and discussed. This also includes some discussions concerning the five human senses and their integration to form an overall decision of quality. In the next part, reception mechanisms of biological systems are briefly described with emphasis on the taste system of the tongue. A large section on properties of some lipid membranes then follows, including their potential as membranes for the taste sensing system. The next section covers principles and properties of biosensors, followed by a chapter on odour sensors - so-called electronic noses. The principles of olfaction and its basis for the electronic nose are discussed. The taste sensing system is thoroughly described in a large section. The abilities of different membranes to detect the five tastes of the tongue (sweet, sour, bitter, salt and umami) are described. Details of many applications, mainly in the food industry, are given. In the last part, other methods to measure taste based on impedance, surface plasmon resonance and surface photovoltage are described. Finally, some future aspects towards a common sensing system based on artificial analogues to all human senses are touched upon.
To summarize the book, it covers all essential areas in biomimetic sensor technologies, biosensors, electronic noses and electronic tongues. It also covers multivariate data processing techniques, which are a very important aspect of these systems. It examines the term `deliciousness', which actually is the combination of the information from all five human senses to give an overall impression of the experience of the food. The initial part on sensors and measurement methods is very valuable in putting the subsequent chapters in perspective. The section dealing with artificial membrane properties, however, is rather large, and there is little description of how biological membranes work. Thus, a section dealing more deeply with olfaction and biological receptors would have made the book more complete. The hypothesis of how membrane binding can start excitation in a receptor cell and how this can be a used as a prototype for a taste sensor, however, is interesting.
Although the term `electronic tongue' suggests measurements on taste, most of the research groups working with this concept are trying to find not the taste but the quality. The taste sensing system describes the result in terms of the five basic senses of the tongue. It is a little confusing, then, when in some cases this system also refers to more general properties of quality. It is also surprising that no other concepts of electronic tongues are mentioned in the book.
This book is recommended to researchers in the field of electronic noses and tongues. Part of it could also be useful for introducing postgraduate students to the biomimetic approach in sensor technology.
Fredrik Winquist
The influence of color on flavor was investigated using 310 untrained volunteers who each judged the flavor of 1 of 8 beverages. Artificially flavored raspberry and orange beverages were either left uncolored, or colored red, orange, or green. Color had a significant influence on the identification of both flavors, although every combination of color and flavor was identified correctly beyond the level expected by chance. Performance was degraded equally when beverages were uncolored, and facilitated equally when beverages were appropriately colored. Unusual color-flavor combinations reduced the identification of raspberry flavor more than that of orange flavor. The influence of color was particularly salient because tasters were aware that the color of the beverage might be inappropriate to its flavor.
In this paper, we review the empirical literature concerning the important question of whether or not food color influences
taste and flavor perception in humans. Although a superficial reading of the literature on this topic would appear to give
a somewhat mixed answer, we argue that this is, at least in part, due to the fact that many researchers have failed to distinguish
between two qualitatively distinct research questions. The first concerns the role that food coloring plays in the perception
of the intensity of a particular flavor (e.g., strawberry, banana, etc.) or taste attribute (e.g., sweetness, saltiness, etc.). The second
concerns the role that food coloring plays in the perception of flavor identity. The empirical evidence regarding the first question is currently rather ambiguous. While some researchers have reported
a significant crossmodal effect of changing the intensity of a food or drink’s coloring on people’s judgments of taste or
flavor intensity, many others have failed to demonstrate any such effect. By contrast, the research findings concerning the
second question clearly support the view that people’s judgments of flavor identity are often affected by the changing of
a food or drink’s color (be it appropriate, inappropriate, or absent). We discuss the possible mechanisms underlying these
crossmodal effects and suggest some of the key directions for future research in order to move our understanding in this area
forward.
KeywordsFlavor-Taste-Color-Perception-Crossmodal-Multisensory-Expectancy-Attention
An electronic tongue based on the sensor array of non-specific solution sensors together with pattern recognition tools has been applied to qualitative analysis of different beverages. It has been found that it is capable both to discriminate reliably between various sorts of the same type of beverages (tea, coffee, beer, soft drinks, juice, etc.) and to monitor the process of aging of juice. Correlations have been found between integral parameters produced by electronic tongue and quality of juice. Some conceptions and backgrounds used for electronic tongue development have been put forward and discussed.
The electronic tongue based on a sensor array comprising 23 potentiometric cross-sensitive chemical sensors and pattern recognition and multivariate calibration data processing tools was applied to the analysis of Italian red wines. The measurements were made in 20 samples of Barbera d’Asti and in 36 samples of Gutturnio wine. The electronic tongue distinguished all wine samples of the same denomination and vintage, but from different vineyards. Simultaneously the following quantitative parameters of the wines were measured by the electronic tongue with precision within 12%: total and volatile acidity, pH, ethanol content, contents of tartaric acid, sulphur dioxide, total polyphenols, glycerol, etc. The electronic tongue is sensitive to multiple substances that determine taste and flavour of wine and, hence, the system was capable of predicting human sensory scores with average precision of 13% for Barbera d’Asti wines and 8% for Gutturnio wines.
We report a study designed to investigate the influence of fruit acids (in particular, citric and malic acid) on people’s perception of the identity and the intensity of a variety of different fruit-flavored solutions. Participants had to identify the flavor of fruit-flavored drinks that were colored yellow, grey, orange, red, or else were presented as colorless solutions. The participants also rated the intensity of flavor, sweetness, and sourness of each solution using a Labelled Magnitude Scale (LMS). The participants identified the flavors of the beverages more accurately when citric and malic acids were added to the solutions, and/or when the solutions were colored appropriately. Moreover, the perception of flavor intensity was modulated by the presence of the fruit acids in the solutions.
The Straw-like User Interface is a novel interface system that allows us to virtually experience the sensations of drinking. These sensations are created based on referencing sample data of actual pressure, vibration and sound produced by drinking from an ordinary straw attached to the system. This research of presenting virtual drinking sensations to mouth and lips is the first in the world to have been attempted, and comes with high academic expectations. Moreover, due to the high sensitivity of the mouth and lips when used as a sensor, it is possible to develop many unique interfaces and so this could facilitate an extension of research fields in both interactive arts and entertainment.
The Straw-like User Interface is a novel interface system that allows us to virtually experience the sensations of drinking. These sensations are created based on referencing sample data of actual pressure, vibration and sound produced by drinking from an ordinary straw attached to the system. This research of presenting virtual drinking sensations to the mouth and lips is the first attempted, and carries high academic expectations. Moreover, due to the high sensitivity of the mouth and lips if used as a sensor, it is possible to develop many unique interfaces and can facilitate an extension of research fields in both interactive arts and entertainment.
In this paper, we propose a method to augment gustation and increase the number of perceptible tastes. Electric taste is the sensation elicited upon stimulating the tongue with electric current. We used this phenomenon to convey information that humans cannot perceive with their tongue. Our method involves changing the taste of foods and drinks by using electric taste. First, we propose a system to drink beverages using straws that are connected to an electric circuit. Second, we propose a system to eat foods using a fork or chopsticks connected to an electric circuit. Finally, we discuss augmented gustation using various sensors.
In this research, we aim to realize a gustatory display that enhances our experience of enjoying food. However, generating a sense of taste is very difficult because the human gustatory system is quite complicated and is not yet fully understood. This is so because gustatory sensation is based on chemical signals whereas visual and auditory sensations are based on physical signals. In addition, the brain perceives flavor by combining the senses of gustation, smell, sight, warmth, memory, etc. The aim of our research is to apply the complexity of the gustatory system in order to realize a pseudo-gustatory display that presents flavors by means of visual feedback. This paper reports on the prototype system of such a display that enables us to experience various tastes without changing their chemical composition through the superimposition of virtual color. The fundamental thrust of our experiment is to evaluate the influence of cross-sensory effects by superimposing virtual color onto actual drinks and recording the responses of subjects who drink them. On the basis of experimental results, we concluded that visual feedback sufficiently affects our perception of flavor to justify the construction of pseudo-gustatory displays.
Disorders of taste and smell commonly present diagnostic dilemmas to the medical profession. This may be secondary to the lack of knowledge and understanding of these conditions. There seems to be a low level of interest in the disorders, when compared with disruption of the other senses such as sight and hearing. Nevertheless, impairment of these senses are common and may be life threatening, especially when they involve the elderly patient. The aetiology of the conditions is widespread, and extend beyond the content of this article. This article will relate only to how the ageing process may contribute to sensory dysfunction. It will focus on how the ageing process changes the normal anatomy and physiology of the senses, how this effects the person's quality of life, and the current management of these conditions.
Liquid cleaner-disinfectant composition for use in wiping down dental operatories
- R J Dobrin
R.J. Dobrin. 1984. Liquid cleaner-disinfectant
composition for use in wiping down dental operatories.
(Aug. 7 1984). US Patent 4,464,293.
Liquid cleaner-disinfectant composition for use in wiping down dental operatories. (Aug. 7 1984)
- Dobrin R.J.