Taste psychophysics and the Beidler equation

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Abstract
The relationship between taste response and stimulus concentration, as determined by neurophysiological work on animals, is commonly described by the Beidler taste equation. This paper demonstrates that the Beidler equation also provides a good description of the human taste response, as obtained by two psychophysical methods (JND cumulation, category rating). Application of the Beidler equation to psychophysical data allows determination of stimulus parameters (the binding constant, K, and the maximum response, Rmax) for human taste perception, hitherto unobtainable. It may also open the way to express taste intensities in terms of a universal Taste Coefficient, a potentially more tractable means of quantifying the taste response.