Taste responsiveness of chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and black-handed spider monkeys (Ateles geoffroyi) to eight substances tasting sweet to humans

Abstract

Using a two-bottle choice test of short duration, we determined taste preference thresholds for eight substances tasting sweet to humans in three chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and four black-handed spider monkeys (Ateles geoffroyi). We found that the chimpanzees significantly preferred concentrations as low as 100–500 mM galactose, 250 mM sorbitol, 0.5–2 mM acesulfame K, 0.5–2.5 mM alitame, 0.5 mM aspartame, 0.2–2 mM sodium saccharin, 0.001–0.2 mM thaumatin, and 0.0025–0.005 mM monellin over tap water. The spider monkeys displayed lower taste preference threshold values, and thus a higher sensitivity than the chimpanzees, with five of the eight substances (2–20 mM galactose, 20–50 mM sorbitol, 0.2–1 mM acesulfame K, 0.002–0.005 mM alitame, and 0.002–0.5 mM sodium saccharin), but were generally unable to perceive the sweetness of the remaining three substances (aspartame, thaumatin, and monellin). The ranking order of sweetening potency of the eight taste substances used here correlates significantly between chimpanzees and humans, but not between spider monkeys and humans. This is in line with genetic findings reporting a higher degree of sequence identity in the Tas1r2 and the Tas1r3 genes coding for the mammalian heterodimer sweet-taste receptor between chimpanzees and humans compared to spider monkeys and humans. Taken together, the findings of the present study support the notion that taste responsiveness for substances tasting sweet to humans may correlate positively with phylogenetic relatedness. At the same time, they are also consistent with the notion that co-evolution between fruit-bearing plants and the sense of taste in animals that serve as their seed dispersers may explain between-species differences in sweet-taste perception.