A HYPOTHESIS FOR THE CHEMICAL BASIS FOR SOURNESS PERCEPTION IN ACID SOLUTIONS AND FOODS

To test the hypothesis that sourness perception in acid or acidified foods is dependent upon the concentration of organic acids in a product with at least one protonated carboxyl group plus free hydrogen ions. The specific objectives in meeting the general objective will be: (1) to determine sourness intensity of individual acids as a function of pH to evaluate whether all acids have about equal sourness and if multi-protic acids reach maximum intensity with only one carboxyl group protonated; (2) in water solutions, to test the relationship between acid species with at least one proton and sourness intensity with random mixtures of acids; (3) to validate any relationships found in objective 2 by creating acid mixtures and testing if they have a previously predicted sourness intensity; (4) to test the relationship between protonated acid species in a group of acidified vegetables and the sourness intensity with random additions of acid mixtures; (5) to validate
relationships found in objective 4 by creating acid mixtures in acidified vegetable products and testing to see if they have the predicted sourness.