Increased bitter taste detection thresholds in Yucatan inhabitants related to coffee as a dietary source of niacin

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Abstract
Persons subsisting on corn diets are at risk for pellagra, a complex disease of malnutrition, which responds partially to niacin therapy. Coffee, once roasted and brewed, contains therapeutic levels of niacin, but is bitter tasting. Reduced taste sensitivity to some bitter evoking substances is transmitted by a simple Mendelian process as a recessive trait. This report describes the study of a sample of Yucatan inhabitants who used coffee extensively and who were generally less sensitive to the bitter taste of PTC, which is possibly the result of the survival advantage conferred by being relatively less sensitive to the bitter taste of coffee. It is speculated that a person, who is less sensitive to bitter tastes, would consume more coffee and, thus, offset the deleterious effects of a niacin deficient corn diet.

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