The mechanism by which an organism recognizes an amino acid-deficient diet has been discovered by a UC Davis researcher and her colleagues. Previous experiments exclude the roles of taste and smell in sensing the amino acid composition of food, and cannot determine the mysterious sense mechanism with which living things adapt diets to meet their amino acid requirements. The mechanism, according to Dorothy Gietzen, a neurophysiology and nutrition expert of the UCD School of Veterinary Medicine, is very well-preserved in all mammals and even some unicellular organisms. It allows them to respond to nutritional stress and choose the right combination of foods that will enable them to survive. The mechanism works in all living things without utilizing any of the five senses.
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