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Right then children. We’re here at the doctor’s to take a good look at a human tongue, so stay close please and try not to get swallowed.

Now the tongue is actually a muscle, and its surface can detect all sorts of different tastes, temperatures and textures.

The tongue is covered in lots of little bumps. On the walls and grooves of these bumps are thousands of tiny taste buds, too small for the human eye to see.

The buds sense the taste of everything they come into contact with. This taste information gets turned into signals that get sent to the brain, telling it what kind of food is being eaten and whether it’s safe to eat.

There are five main tastes that the tongue can pick out: sweet, sour, savoury, salty and bitter.

All five tastes can be detected on every part of the tongue, although the sides are usually more sensitive than the middle.

There are different types of taste buds. Some respond only to one taste. These signal to the brain how strong that taste is. Other buds can sense all of the tastes. The brain is told how much there is of each taste and builds up an overall idea of the flavour of the food being eaten.

A human’s sense of taste doesn’t just rely on the tongue. It has a lot to do with the nose as well, which senses the smell of different foods before and while they’re being eaten.

So, if a human has a blocked nose due to a bad cold, it doesn’t matter how sensitive the taste buds are, they’ll find it difficult to taste what they’re eating.

Well, we better leave the doctor to it. This human doesn’t look all that well…

COUGHING

Oh, charming!